


pinky promise

by jeynestheon



Series: love, sansa [1]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Childhood Friends to Lovers, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Hockey, Jon Snow and the Starks Are Not Related, Mutual Pining, Teen Pregnancy, emotional unavailability, figure skating, is that a tag????, whatever jon is a dickhead incapable of properly expressing himself
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-11
Updated: 2020-12-29
Packaged: 2021-03-10 16:48:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 21,614
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28010424
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jeynestheon/pseuds/jeynestheon
Summary: “It’s just—it’s been a while. Since you’ve been home.” Heat infuses her neck and cheeks. “I know everyone else would really like to see you. We’ve missed you..a lot. I—” I’ve missed you. She cuts herself off, swallowing the words again. “I know we all have. It’d be nice if you came by. Not even the party. Just...any time, you know? Before you leave again.”There’s a line, one that separates earnesty from being downright desperate. She’s approaching it fast. Jon looks away, like he senses it too, but then he looks at her again, surprisingly gentle, probably in ways he isn’t aware of.“Sure.” His voice is quiet. “I’ll come see you.”
Relationships: Jon Snow/Sansa Stark
Series: love, sansa [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2051583
Comments: 75
Kudos: 286





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> love rosie au reboot in which it is actually only 40% love rosie, 30% normal people by sally rooney, and 30% spinning out on netflix.
> 
> P.S: as this is somewhat a normal people au their relationship will be similar to marianne and connell’s if you don’t like that don’t read
> 
> PPS: i listened to betty by taylor swift on repeat while writing this so i recommend giving it a stream!

Sansa eyes her reflection critically in the glass of the frozen goods aisle, still foolishly convinced that there’s a way out of this. 

There are still circles underneath her eyes from all the stress baking she did after finals. The most she bothered to do with her hair was wrestle it into a top knot, tangles and all. And she’s never been _more_ aware of how truly awful her sister’s earnest attempt at a christmas sweater was until this moment, standing just feet away from the last person on earth she wants to see her looking like this. 

She’s lost count of how many times she’s looked over her shoulder to _still_ find him there, thumbing through spice jars. Each time feels like the first time, a sharp elbow to the gut. He’s leaner. Tanner. More muscular. Nearly clean shaven. Less rugged, like Chicago had taken a jagged piece of coal and attempted to buff him into something more respectable. She’s not sure how to feel about it. 

Not that it matters how she feels about him. 

She could move. She could _leave._ But leaving would mean leaving Rickon, who she promised to wait for in the same exact spot before he left to go find marshmallow fluff with a hopefully trustworthy looking employee, who leaving alone would put her entire family at risk of being banned from the only other Target in a ten mile radius—

So she stays.

At last, he grabs two jars and drops them in his basket, straightening his back. Hope is climbing up her throat hesitant and hopeful, as he reaches into his pocket for his phone, typing out a message. She wonders if he still has her number, then realizes quickly that she doesn’t wanna know.

“Jon!”

Just like that, any hope she had, begins to circle the drain. 

Rickon, who has apparently turned his guide loose, comes barreling towards him like a freight train, full speed ahead. He tucks the marshmallow fluff underneath his arm to throw himself at Jon, who catches him like he always does.

“Hey, kid.” He ruffles his hair. She can’t see his face, but it sounds like he’s smiling.

“You never told us you were coming home.” Rickon says accusatory, still clutching at him like a lifeboat.

Jon squeezes his shoulders. “It was a last minute sort of thing.”

“It takes less than a minute to make a phone call.” He shoots back. 

She feels like she’s watching a car crash, only it’s happening to her. She’s in the front seat, wrestling for control, screaming her throat hoarse at the inevitable—his eyes on hers. Sansa turns to face it.

Doesn’t bother bracing herself for impact.

“He’s right.” She forces herself to say. “You’ve made goals in less time.”

He stills, hands still resting on Rickon’s back. It takes him two, three seconds to face her; she counts every single one. All he has to do is turn his head, and then his eyes are on her.

She knows all of his faces, is that embarrassing to admit? She knows his happy face and she knows his brooding face and she knows the face he makes when he’s trying not to laugh, most likely at her, and she knows this face, too. He’s working his jaw like he does when he’s on the ice, facing an opponent. That stings, a little.

  
Are they really strangers to each other now?

“Hey.” He says, voice even.

“Hello.” She was so focused on making her voice sound as level as his, she ended up sounding like a formal robot. She feels like she’s failing some sort of test and wants to start over again. She says the first thing that comes to mind instead. “You cut your hair.” 

“Yeah.” One of his oven mitt like hands comes up to run hand through his dark curls, almost self consciously. A waver in his facade. “My mom did it—she wouldn’t shut up about it.”

“I like it.” Sansa blurts. “I liked it the other way too, but—you look nice.”

Jon doesn’t cringe at the comment like most guys would, like even she wanted to as soon as it left her mouth, but he was never like most people. 

“Thanks. You look…” He trails off, brow pinching together. He’s looking at her sweater. Then his mouth gives that tell tale twitch. 

Sansa crosses her arms over her chest to hide what was supposed to be Rudolph the red nosed reindeer, glaring. “Don’t finish that.”

“You don’t even know what I was gonna say.”

“It wasn’t anything _nice_.”

And he laughs. God. That laugh. He tosses back his head and all. It makes her feel warm all over and jittery, like extra sugary hot chocolate. 

It’s better than hot chocolate.

“I was just gonna say you haven’t changed at all.” He grins at her.

Her heart skips a beat. 

Rickon tugs at the bottom of his shirt, impatient. “Are you coming to the party tonight?”

The Stark’s annual christmas party had been the event of the season since Arya was born. The night before Christmas, her parents hosted people at their house with the promise of a home cooked feast, her mother’s infamous eggnog, and an assortment of cookies baked from scratch. Everyone was invited—from closest friends to neighbors to coworkers—and everyone came. Even Jon came. But that was before he left.

“My mom wants to.” He admits.

“Please come.” Rickon jumped up and down, pulling his arm. “Everyone’s gonna be there! And we’ll have cookies and eggnog and apple cider and rice krispy treats and—”

Rickon continues to describe the dessert table in vivid and grandiose detail, jumping up and down, getting hyper just talking about it. Jon listens patiently, almost fondly, as he grins. 

“Sounds appetizing.” He remarks indulgently, suppressing a laugh. “You’ll be there?”

It takes her a moment to realize that he’s talking to her. 

  
Sansa blinks. Inside of her boots, her toes are curling. She forces a casual sort of shrug. “It’s at my house.”

“No ski lodges in the alps? No tanning in the keys?” His eyes are narrowed and one corner of his mouth is trying to run away in a different direction from the other and he’s _teasing_ her. Joking around with her. She’s so warm she forgets to be annoyed, actually has to force herself.

“Don’t you party with Sports Illustrated models in your giant penthouse now?” 

“It’s not that giant.”

“So you’re not denying the models, then?”

He laughs again, and she scowls and now he’s grinning, full on. Like he used to. Her throat dries at the sight, something fluttering in her chest. 

“No wonder you don’t come home as often.” She forces her voice to be light. “You’ve forgotten all about us.”

His smile fades a little, as his hands find his pockets. “I couldn’t forget about you even if I tried.”

_Thump. Thump._ Her heart in her ears. Her pulse in her throat.

“Does that mean you’re coming?” She feels breathless. “To the party.”

He rubs the back of his neck. “Maybe.”

Maybe. The word jabs into her like a hot poker, forcing her to release a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding. She hopes the blow isn’t so obvious.

“It’s just—it’s been a while. Since you’ve been home.” Heat infuses her neck and cheeks. “I know everyone else would really like to see you. We’ve missed you..a lot. I—” _I’ve missed you._ She cuts herself off, swallowing the words again. “I know we all have. It’d be nice if you came by. Not even the party. Just...any time, you know? Before you leave again.”

There’s a line, one that separates earnesty from being downright desperate. She’s approaching it fast. Jon looks away, like he senses it too, but then he looks at her again, surprisingly gentle, probably in ways he isn’t aware of. 

“Sure.” His voice is quiet. “I’ll come see you.”

Seconds pass, as she stands there, allowing the relief to wash over her. The tentative hope. But the cost of it is an awkward silence, one that tells her it’s time to move on. 

“Sansa, Mom texted and said the eggnog is ready.” Rickon whines, paying no attention to it. “I want first dibs.”

“Right. Well—we should get going.” She forces a smile, gripping the handle of her shopping basket until her knuckles turn white. “My mom needs these ingredients, and you know how she gets.”

“Yeah.” He cuts her off. “You better get going.” 

Rickon hugs him one last time and Sansa just stands there, wishing she had the courage. Instead, she gives an awkward wave and beckons Rickon along. She walks fast. He has to jog to keep up with her long strides. She’s trying to keep herself from looking back, but she does it anyway. Right before turning the corner. 

He’s already gone. 

* * *

The dress is a surplice. The neckline crosses over her chest and the silk wraps nicely around her waist, making it look successfully dainty. Her cleavage is there, but tasteful. The dress is dark blue. 

He’s always liked her in blue.

“Is Harry coming tonight?”

Sansa waits until she finishes lining her lips to answer. “I told him not to like—a million times. Why?”

“Because you look outrageously hot.” Jeyne says. “That’s why.”

It’s an effort not to blush. She focuses on her eyeliner instead. “We’re taking pictures afterwards. For the new year cards.”

“Shit.” Jeyne comes to join her in her bathroom. Gestures to her eyelash curler. “Can I borrow that?”

They spend the first half hour of the party primping, blowing eyelashes out of each other's eyes and alternating between passing a flat iron and a wax pen back and forth. Thinking about Harry makes her feel hurt and betrayed all over again, but she can’t help but feel guilty over how the moment she saw Jon at the store she forgot he existed.

Then she finds herself thinking about Jon. About his dark eyes and smile-that’s-not-a-smile. About that pinch in his brow he gets when he’s being stubborn. About the silver chain he’s been wearing around his neck since the age of thirteen. About the way his eyes crinkled in the corners when he laughed and how she had made him laugh today, when he told her he was gonna come see her. 

It’s easy to stop thinking about Harry after that. 

When they head downstairs to join the party, they’re only slightly less sober than they were when they started out the evening. 

Her mother’s gaze sharpens like a hawk when she eyes the dress she’s wearing. “Where’s your christmas sweater?”

“If I have to wear this shit, so should you.” Arya argues, plucking her itchy green sweater.

Catelyn starts reaming into her for cursing, and Sansa’s dress code violation is forgotten. She is scooping eggnog into a solo cup—the batch spiked with bourbon is downstairs with Robb and Theon—when the doorbell rings. Her heart skips a beat and she tries not to look too interested as her dad goes to open the door.

It’s only the Umbers. Sansa deflates but just a little bit. He’d be here soon enough. 

Jeyne wants to go downstairs, where everyone else their age is hanging out, but Sansa pretends to help her mother in the kitchen so she can see the door better. She’s there for the better part of an hour, fussing with the arrangement of certain cookies and guarding them from Rickon and his little friends. She can hear her parents laughing in the den, and she entertains their friends, who come up to her to exclaim over how big she’s gotten, between taking surreptitious, hopeful glances at the door.

He’s not coming. 

The realization sinks into her gradually, as she sits on one the bar stools at the island, hand clutching her cup. It’s ten. Guests haven’t arrived since the hour before. Not even Lyanna Snow walks through that door. 

He’s not coming. He said he would, but he isn’t. The hurt she feels is jagged and palpable but the humiliation that follows immediately overwhelms it all like a tide. There’s a permanent feeling of stinging everywhere, as if her entire body has been slapped with a giant hand. 

She doesn’t have time for this. 

Humiliation. Hurt—none of it. Sansa stomps down into the basement, kicking off her heels as soon as she leaves the last step. She heads straight for the table. 

“If it isn’t the life of the party.” Arya drawls from where she sits beside Gendry on the armchair. 

Sansa doesn’t spare her a glance, uncapping the bottle of cinnamon schnapps, taking a long pull. It burns down her throat. She coughs once, says over her shoulder, “Shut up.”

Theon’s eyebrows rise with a laugh. “Someone’s snappy.”

“Shut up.” Jeyne smacks him upside the head, and gives her a worried look. “You okay?”

Sansa pours herself an entire cup full, not daring to look away from the stream in case her face betrayed anything. “Why wouldn’t I be?” 

She drinks three sips, before wincing and abandoning it completely, taking up Jeyne’s pen instead. She feels the rude sting all over her body start to recede, slowly but surely, the more she exhales smoke.

“You’re thinking about him.”

Sansa’s head jerks up. “What?”

“Harry.” Jeyne comes to sit beside her, bumping their shoulders together. “You’re thinking about him. You’ve got that pensive look on your face.”

She never told anyone about Jon, not Jeyne or even her diary. It’s been her secret for as long as she can remember. Only just recently did she stop keeping it from herself. But what is she keeping, exactly? What is there to tell? Nothing.

Nothing. That’s what she is to him. What she’s always been. What this imaginary thing she’s had rotting her brain for the last five years amounts to. A whole bunch of nothing. It’s fine. It’s whatever.

Who else does she have to blame besides herself?

“You know, when you go to the Olympics eventually, he’s gonna be kicking his own ass for cheating on you and missing out on the opportunity to be your average looking trophy husband.”

Sansa snorts. “Average looking?” 

“I’m trying to make you feel better, dumbass.” Jeyne elbows her. 

They burst into laughter, leaning into each other to keep their balance. Jeyne does an indepth debriefing on all of Harry’s worst physical attributes—his abhorrent six pack and his hideous straw colored hair and his too perfect smile— until they’re both clutching at their stomachs. 

“I’ve called him like eight times.” Robb complains. “Where the hell is he?”

Sansa’s amusement dies a little.

“Who cares?” Theon scoffs. “He’s always thought he was better than us. 

“Not all of us.” Arya puts in. “Just you.” 

Beside her, Gendry snickers. 

“Maybe he doesn’t feel well,” Jeyne Westerling, Robb’s girlfriend, wraps an arm around his waist and leans into him. “Or his phone is dead, or—”

“He’s moping.” Robb cuts her off. “Like he always is. That fucking kid, I swear to God....” 

“Jon’s in town?” Jeyne Poole asks her, voice lowered, to which Sansa just nods, not trusting herself to speak.

“Wow.” Her eyebrows lift a little. “It’s been awhile.”

Sansa unwraps a stick of cinnamon gum, giving herself something to do. “I guess.” 

There’s a lot more bickering between Robb and Theon, an entire conversation Sansa spends blowing six huge bubbles until they pop, skimming through the messages Harry sent her, is _still_ sending her, while Jeyne is beside her, trying out instagram filters, pulling her in for the occasional photo. 

“Let’s go.” Robb stands up at last , tells Theon. “Get my keys. You’re driving.”

“Not drunk off his ass, he isn’t.” Jeyne throws her leg over Theon’s lap to bar him from going anywhere. He looks quite pleased with this development, running his hands over her calves. “Where do you think you’re going, anyway? It’s Christmas Eve.”

“Exactly.” Robb emphasizes. “It’s Christmas Eve and Jon should be here. Just like he’s been here every other Christmas Eve.”

He slips on his jacket, pausing when he realizes he’s the only one moving. “Is anyone gonna drive me or do you guys want me to wrap myself around a pole?”

Sansa bites through her bubble, teeth meeting her tongue.

* * *

She’s not sure how the seven of them end up in a car, but it happens. 

Jeyne Westerling decides she’ll drive after correctly assuming he isn’t gonna shut up about it anytime soon and Arya comes because she wants to give Jon a piece of her mind and anywhere Arya goes, Gendry follows her like a disgruntled, mostly harmless pitbull and Theon goes because Robb is going and Jeyne Poole goes because Theon is going and Sansa—

She knows why she’s there, and the longer she spends inside the car, the more stupid she feels.

“Why are you guys chasing someone who doesn’t wanna spend time with you?” She mutters.

“He does want to.” Arya scowls, looking indignant. “ He’s just being stupid.”

Sansa grinds her jaw, gum flavorless. “He has a funny way of showing it.”

“He’s family.” Robb looks at her in the rearview mirror. “You don’t give up on family.”

Family. The word makes her itch. She repeats it with disdain, folding her arms over her chest. “I must be missing the math.”

“Why did you even come if you’re just gonna complain the whole time?” Arya snaps.

They bicker the entire short drive, Sansa pushing Arya’s buttons admittedly more than she should because she needs _something_ to distract her. But before she knows it, Jeyne Westerling is pulling up at the rink. They all clamber out, like clowns packed into one tiny car. Sansa shivers inside of her coat against the cold.

She looks over at Robb. “How do you even know he’s here?” 

Surprisingly, it’s Jeyne Poole that answers. “Where else would he be?”

That’s the thing about hockey players and growing up in a hockey town. It’s more than a sport. It’s a lifestyle. For a lot of Winterfell kids from the age of three to eighteen, it’s their only personality trait. And if you’re like her father or Jon and you go pro, it becomes more than a personality trait. It’s a part of you, a nasty, ugly piece of cartilage you’ll never be able to get rid of.

Of course he’d be here.

There’s three people in town that have a key to the rink: her dad, Robb, and Jon. Her dad because he was the general manager of the club, Robb because he’d be the general manager of the club, and Jon because his mother was the cleaning lady, and it wasn’t unusual for him to hold onto things for her, with her tendency to lose things. 

_Bang-bang-bang._

It’s all she hears, as soon as they come inside, the sound of a puck hitting the side of the rink enclosure. She’s plenty familiar with the sound. Grew up on it. 

_Bang-bang-bang._

There’s a brief pause, and she knows without even seeing him that he’s collecting all of the pucks with gloved hands. Placing them back on the ice again.

_Bang-bang-bang._

  
  


There’s only one light on in the entire arena, a single bar of flickering white hanging above the ice. It shines on his head, makes his hair look darker than it is. He’s got half of it pulled back from his face. He isn’t looking up. Maybe he hadn’t heard them come in. Maybe he just doesn’t care. 

_Bang-bang-bang._

One puck after another, into the goalie net, banging against the wall with an echo. He’d have made it even with someone standing there. He knows it. It’s unsatisfying, she sees it as he straightens himself and leans up against his stick, rubbing at the tape with the side of his thumb. His hair is mussed with sweat. Even doing a practice drill, he gives it his all.

“There you are!”

Jon looks up, brow pinched, as if he’s just come back down to earth. His head swivels, eyes squinting. “Robb?”

“Oh, he remembers what I look like.” Robb’s eyebrows shoot up. “I’m actually surprised.”

“What about me, superstar?” Theon calls out, with that special, punchable grin. “Think I can get an autograph?”

“Fuck off, Greyjoy.”

“What are you doing in the dark like a serial killer?” Arya demands, wandering the circumference of the arena. “Where are the lights?”

“How did you—” Jon begins.

“How’d we know you were being antisocial and hiding out at the rink on Christmas eve?” Robb finishes for him. “Gee, I don’t know. It’s not like I’ve known you for half my life, or anything.”

Arya steps onto the ice, shoes and all, wollops Jon in his stomach. 

“Ow.” He exclaims. 

“I should do worse!” Arya shouts. “Dude, what the fuck? You’re in town on Christmas eve and you don’t call? We have to find out from Rickon and Sansa?”

And he looks out into the darkness, finds _her._ Something passes over his face, something like guilt but she doesn’t give it the time of day. She disappears around the corner instead. 

  
The door to her dad’s office is unlocked. She shuts it behind her, leaning against it and taking a shaky breath.

That stinging feeling is back. She takes out her phone, anxious to ignore it. There are three missed calls from Harry. 17 unread messages. 

She contemplates calling him for a second, no longer. Then she shuts her phone off so the option is no longer available to her. She’s not that lonely.

Lonely. 

She’s always been a little bit lonely. Anyone who isn’t a hockey player that lives in Winterfell is cursed with loneliness. It’s not meant to be a punishment, it’s simply all they know. And if you don’t know it, they don’t care to know you.

Jon did, though.

Or she thought he did. Whatever. He doesn’t anymore, clearly. Ever since she saw him earlier for the first time in years, something horrible had begun to build up in her chest. Horrible and hopeful. Now all that’s left is just dread. 

She remembers how she felt when she heard Jon got drafted. It was similar to the feeling of popping a jump before you could make it. Like she missed out on something. Like her big chance had come and gone, and now she was getting left behind. Like he was leaving her behind.

  
He had.

  
In a way, she left herself, too. That girl who’d do anything for him to like her—that isn’t who she is, anymore. In a few days, if she performed well enough, she’d be a member of the US team and go onto Worlds. It was like Jeyne said—she was gonna be an Olympian one day. He shouldn’t matter.

For awhile, at least, she could at least pretend he didn’t. But now he’s back.

There are pictures on her father’s desk. There’s one of the Junior league winning the cup a few years back, Jon’s holding it, grinning unabashedly. He’d never smiled at her like that.

She’d never be hockey to him. She should have stopped trying a long time ago.

“Sans.” There’s a knock on the door. Jeyne Poole. “We’re putting on our skates. You coming?”

“Yeah.” She places the picture face down, as if she’s shutting a door that had been letting in the cold for a lot longer than she should have. “Coming.”

  
  


* * *

_Good Form_ is playing through the speakers when they leave the locker room. 

“Theon, you’re supposed to be playing Christmas music!” Jeyne Poole complains. 

Theon’s already doing a bunch of crude, _lewd_ gestures that he refers to as dancing. “My aux, my rules, JP!”

“It’s actually _my_ aux.” Robb reminds him. “And I say we listen to Fleetwood Mac.”

“And that’s _exactly_ why it isn’t your fucking aux anymore.”

Robb’s got his arm looped around Jon’s neck, and he uses the same hand to flip Theon off. They’re perfectly chummy again, of course. When Sansa glides onto the ice, she gives them a wide berth.

She feels him watching her. 

Even as she distracts herself by coaxing Jeyne Westerling, who’s never been a big skater, onto the ice. Even as she takes Jeyne Poole’s side in an argument with Theon that she doesn’t really care to follow. It makes her mind race, and she ends up doing a couple laps trying to outrun it. 

“Hey.”

Sansa looks over her shoulder, from where she watches Robb reward Jeyne’s baby strides on the ice with a kiss on her forehead, not even bothering to ignore the ache of longing in her chest. It intensifies at the sound of his voice, embarrassingly enough. Strengthens.

He’s standing there, the same bottle of Schnapps from the house unopened at his side—Robb must have brought it. He’s watching her, bottom lip caged underneath his teeth. His nose is red from the cold. He almost looks unsure, and for a moment, she thinks he might apologize.

He nods at her skates. “Do something pretty.”

She grounds her jaw, stifling a scoff. She rolls her eyes instead. If he’s determined to act like he did nothing wrong, then she can pretend she doesn’t care. 

“What do I get?” She tilts her head. 

Jon smirks, suddenly, but it’s all thawed and soft at the edges. Just like his eyes. “My undying admiration and devotion.”

She flushes, and immediately turns so that he doesn’t see. She can hear her heart over the music. Jeyne got her wish—Last Christmas is playing, and she feels like she’s in the world’s most cheesiest Hallmark romcom. 

She hears it, his skates against the ice. Feels him behind her, looming like a ghost. His voice is so low, only she hears it. 

“Please?” 

It’s not a word that comes out his mouth often.

Sansa wants to lean back, wants to know just how close he is. If she’d come to rest against his chest. If he’d let her. If he’d wrap his arms around her, in front of everyone.

She pushes off the ice for takeoff instead, extending her leg out into a turn, using her toes as a starting point before she leaps into the air. She lands just in time to hear both Theon and Jeyne whistling at her. Arya calls out, “Show off!”

He’s clapping, as she makes her way back toward him, mouth tugging up on one side. Her heart actually skips a beat.

“Happy?” She’s only slightly out of breath.

Wordless, Jon extends the bottle of schnapps towards her, like it’s her prize. Just as she goes to take it, he moves it from her reach.

Her face is hot. “Jerk.”

She reaches forward, uncomfortably aware of how close they are. She can smell him, soap and aftershave and a little sweat and that one smell that’s distinctly _him._ That one smell she can’t identify, but would know anywhere.

His grin is wicked as he moves it further away. “Hey.”

What is she doing? She never even asked for the bottle in the first place. “Whatever.” She mutters, moving to skate far away from him, from this place, from this stupid, embarrasing cliche she’s stuck in now.

Then he catches her wrist in his hand.

It’s gloveless, and warm and rough and he envelops her entire wrist with just a few of his fingers. 

“Hey.” He repeats, a little quieter and softer. 

Sansa feels frozen, paralyzed. Something is lodged in her throat that definitely shouldn’t be. She can’t meet his eyes, too busy staring at their hands. Too busy staring at their surroundings. Her entire world has stopped spinning and no one seems to notice. 

His thumb sweeps over her pulse. “I’m sorry.”

The apology jars her down to her bones, catching her off guard. She feels very bare, all of the sudden. Almost naked.

“You said you were coming.” She finally meets his eyes, finds them burning uncomfortably bright. 

A muscle works in his jaw, as he briefly looks away. “I got nervous.”

“You don’t get nervous.” She rolls her eyes, but it’s half hearted and weak. 

“I do. Sometimes.” His grip on the bottle tightens very minutely, as watches her. “You make me nervous.”

Everything sounds really far away in that moment, as those words echo in her head. Jeyne Westerling’s squeaks of delight. Arya singing _Wham!_ lyrics loudly and very offkey. The whistling noise her nose has been making this entire time. 

She hears herself croak, very lamely, “Oh.”

“You and me, Snow.” Theon shouts from across the rink. He’s reentering the ice, gloves on. Hockey stick in hand. “Right now. Let’s go.”

His hand drops from her wrist, back to his side briefly, before he uses it to uncap the liquor bottle and take a brief swig. He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. “I don’t feel like indulging you in your humiliation kink, Greyjoy.”

“Scared to lose?”

His eyes narrow at that. “I don’t lose.”

“I wanna play!” Arya says excitedly, skating forward. 

At the word play, Robb drops Jeyne Westerling like a hot potato, luckily catching her before her butt lands on the ice. But the damage is already done. Jeyne stomps off the ice and Robb contemplates going after her, until Theon starts talking about teams and that’s all he’s focused on.

Sansa is still standing there. 

She can still feel his hand still on her wrist, as if he branded her. She watches Jon, who ended up with Arya on his team, talking strategy by the away team goal. The back of his neck is red. 

“I swear to god.” Jeyne Westerling snaps from the bleachers just as Sansa comes out. “Unless we’re pucks, we might as well be invisible.”

“Right.” Jeyne Poole mutters from beside her.

Sansa joins them, but doesn’t say a word. The game below them is starting. It’s three against two—Robb, Theon, and Gendry against Jon and Arya. He’s on defense, has to head back to the goal. His eyes drift up towards hers.

“Right.” Sansa adds, a little belatedly, but more to remind herself than anything.

* * *

They leave the rink half past 10 after Catelyn calls Robb furious—they were only supposed to be taking a walk around the neighborhood. The car with Jon tagging along is a tight squeeze; he walked instead of taking his car. Something they all could have done. 

“Is this okay?” Her cheeks are blazing as she asks him, voice so low she can barely hear herself. “I mean—is this okay? With you?”

She’s sitting in his lap, still frankly blindsided how it occurred. But apparently, she was the only one. She had been the last one to get into the car, expecting to take her tight spot in the middle, but Theon was sitting there with Jeyne on his legs and Arya was already on Gendry’s knees, the two of them sharing headphones, and Jon had looked at her expectantly, matter of factly, as he said, “You plan on walkin’ home? What are you waiting for?”

And now she’s here.

His breath is warm against her neck. Stirs her hair. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

Sansa had tried to keep the seating arrangement as casual as possible, but she couldn’t straighten her back without hitting the car ceiling and she couldn’t talk to him without letting everyone hear their conversation so she’s stuck leaning against him, mouth against his ear. She shrugs.

“Are you?”

She shrugs again.

“It was either this, or walk home in these.” He murmurs, traces a thumb along the heel of her boot. “Your mom would have probably killed you. Aren’t your feet like—insured, or something?”

Sansa lets out a strangled laugh. _“Insured?_ ”

“Yeah.” His stubble rasps against her shoulder, and she feels like she’s melting. “They’re Olympian feet.”

His fingers are still toying with the bottom of her shoe. The entire front of his arm is resting on her thigh, warm. Distracting.

“They aren’t.” She says eventually. “Not yet.”

“As far as I’m concerned, you’ve been an Olympian for as long as I’ve known you. I know what winners look like.”

Sansa looks up to find him already staring at her. It’s that same stare he gave her at the rink. Bright, burning, and earnest. The revelation that he believes in her is too massive for her to comprehend, so she tucks it away, deciding to save it for later. 

“You don’t even know the difference between a toe loop and a triple Salchow.” She leans into the cradle of his neck. “But I appreciate the sentiment.”

She thinks she hears him repeat the word sentiment before he snorts, but she’s too lost in him to tell. In the feel of his hair tickling her cheek. In the smooth warmth of his neck. There’s just enough room for her chin there. Like a puzzle piece. She fingers his chain.

“Are you planning on stealing it from me, or something?” Jon asks after a while, sounding amused.

“No.” Then she pauses. “If you gave it to me as a Christmas present, I wouldn’t have to steal it.”

His answering laughter is low and deep and stirs something within her. Sansa wants to curl up in it and hide inside it forever. 

“Here.” His hand leaves her to pull the chain off his neck. He drapes it over hers, taking extra care to pull her hair out from underneath it, hands cradling the back of her head. 

It’s cold and heavier than she expected, she can’t stop touching it. “You’re giving it to me?” 

“No.” He says, hands dropping back to his side. He’s giving her one of those crooked smiles again. “But since you like it so much, you can wear it for the rest of the night.”

It’s not so much that she likes it. She likes him in it. She likes the look of him in it and its significance. She likes that he trusts her enough to wear it. She likes him. 

She _more_ than likes him. 

Instead of saying that, Sansa takes the hand that was on her thigh and replaces it, just a bit higher above her knee this time. She takes his other hand, placing it on her hip. 

It’s tentative.

It’s deliberate. 

He’s looking back at her, lower lip caged between his teeth again. His eyelids are a little low. She watches him swallow. Visibly. There’s a brief pause, before he pulls at her hip, bringing her closer to him. 

She’s won countless medals and cups but for the first time since she was six she gets a taste of what winning feels like. 

* * *

The party’s still going.

It hasn’t dwindled one bit. If anything, it’s more lively than when they left. Jon’s surprise appearance doesn’t help matters. He’s got people closing in on him like he’s the last sugar cookie.

There are kids doing karaoke in the basement. Luckily, they hadn’t left any liquor out. The worst they got into were the italian wedding cookies, and Ariana Grande’s christmas EP on the Karaoke station.

“I’ve got next!” Robb shouts.

“If he starts singing Fleetwood Whack I’m gonna blow my brains out.” Theon whines.

“Oooh, do they have Britney?” Jeyne Poole asks excitedly.

She listens to them chatter excitedly about music selections, watching these children who she only vaguely remembers seeing before stare at them wide eyed. She busts out laughing.

“What’s so funny?” 

Jon, back from his makeshift meet and greet upstairs, is sitting down beside her on the sofa. He’s got a plate in his hand, no doubt shoved into his possession by all the hockey moms who hoped their sons would follow in his footsteps. 

“We’re doing karaoke.” Sansa curls in on her side so that she’s facing him, chin propped up by her hand. “You want next?”

Jon gave her a withering look. “Hardy fucking har.”

“I’m sure they have like—metallica, or something.” She’s doing her best to fight her smirk. “Or whatever it is that you like.”

She’s unzipping her boots, kicking them off to reveal long, stocking covered legs. He watches. She watches him watch, breathless.

Waiting. 

The once over he gives her is piercing and thorough. He leans back. “You seem to have your own idea of what I like.” 

Sansa leans back too, until her head rests against the couch. Looks into his eyes. Doesn’t breathe for moments at a time. 

“Sometimes I feel like I do.” She admits truthfully. “Other times I feel like I couldn’t be more wrong.”

He says nothing to that, averting his gaze. His face is back to being carefully blank. Closed off. She wonders what she said—what she did that was wrong. 

She’s so tired of wondering.

She’s aware of it, the shifting of weight. The warmth of his body radiating towards her. His voice being closer than where it was before. 

“It suits you.” He says. “Might let you keep it after all.”

It takes her a second to realize he’s talking about the chain, realizing it only when he adjusts it on her neck. His fingers are rough against her skin, even with the barest brush. Sitting like this, with him above her, her entire throat is bared and at his mercy. 

She doesn’t mind.

“No.” Her hand comes up to close around his wrist. “It’s yours.”

His wrist is pressed against her breastbone and his fingers are still touching her throat and for the first time all night she feels calm. Sure of herself. 

“It always will be.” She says.

“MISTLETOE!!!!” Theon shouts, seemingly coming out of _nowhere_ , dangling a sprig of red and white from his hand, right above their heads. “KISS! KISS! KISS! KISS!”

She feels as if she had been in comfortable, warm slumber before getting splashed with a bucket of ice water, so cold that it _hurts,_ so cold that it’s actually frozen her in place—

Heat is creeping up on Jon’s neck and he’s looking everywhere, but her.

“Oh, gross!” Arya’s lip curls in disgust.

“Theon, you are such a perverted ass.” Jeyne Poole groans. 

“Rules are rules!” Theon smirks, shaking the Mistletoe tauntingly. “Kiss or be cursed!”

Gendry’s brow furrows. “I don’t think that’s how it works.” 

“It works how I say it works.” Theon says in a sing-song voice. “Now, kiss!”

“He’d rather kiss a moose.” Robb snickers. Jeyne Westerling elbows him. 

“Are you guys gonna kiss or what?” Theon demands. “My hands are getting tired. Kiss or be cursed!”

Samsa says nothing. She can’t. It’s as if her voice has been taken away from her. She opens and closes her mouth and nothing comes out.

Jon rubs the back of his neck. “I don’t see any moose around.”

Arya laughs. Then Robb too. Even Theon. Everyone’s laughing, except Jeyne, who still looks annoyed. 

“You’re an idiot, Theon.”

“It was worth a shot.” He snickers.

For a while, she sits there, eyes burning. Everyone else has already moved on. Robb is doing Rhiannon on Karaoke and Jeyne Westerling is recording and Theon is mixing something in a pitcher that is most likely toxic, as Jeyne Poole points out, and she feels a hand brush hers, knows who it is because it was brushing her throat moments before—

She’s had enough.

Sansa snatches her hand away and resists the urge to let the door slam shut behind her when she heads upstairs.

* * *

She doesn’t cry.

She refuses to let herself cry over him.

So she stands outside in the cold, coatless, willing her eyes to dry out, and her tears to go away. She curses a bunch, and finds that it makes herself feel better. He’s an asshole. He’s the biggest fucking asshole on the planet and she can’t wait until he’s on the first plane back to Chicago and out of here.

How could she be so fucking stupid?

She sits on the porch swing, her anger having diminished enough to stop pacing. Humiliation replaces it, and before she knows it, the christmas lights across the street are blurring with her tears.

“God.” She says aloud, swiping underneath her eyes, careful not to mess up her makeup.

By the time her eyes are dry again, it’s snowing. Small, frosty, white flakes falling down, steady and silent. With all the Christmas decorations on every house, she feels like she’s inside of a snowglobe. She feels…peaceful. 

It only lasts for seconds.

A BMW pulls up a little ways down the street, sleek, ostentatious, and familiar. Harry pokes his sandy blonde head out, frowning up at the snow, never looking more like he’s from California than he does at this moment. He slams the door shut, a bouquet of red roses close to his chest.

She really doesn’t have the energy for this.

“What are you doing here?” She meets him halfway, in the clutter of cars in their driveway.

Harry frowns again, as if he was expecting a better welcome. “I told you I was coming.”

“And I told you _not_ to. Multiple times.

“Sans, come on.”

“Don’t call me that.”

Hurt is burgeoning in her chest, hurt she honestly thought she was over. But a betrayal of trust isn’t something you can just get over, can you? Even when your heart wasn’t all the way in it.

But she wanted it to be. 

“You need to leave Harry.” Sansa says. “Now.”

“You can’t just keep avoiding me,” His eyes are searching and pleading. That’s always been her soft spot. Those big, puppy dog eyes. “Just hear me out—please. We have to talk about this.”

She shifts away from him. “There’s nothing to talk about.” 

His brow furrows. “You don’t mean that.”

“Stop trying to tell me what I mean!” Her voice rises. 

“I already told you it was a mistake, Sansa.” Harry lets out a sharp exhale. “It was a mistake, and I’m sorry. Tell me what to do so we can move on from this and I’ll do it.”

“I don’t even know if I want there to be a _we_ anymore, Harry!” She explodes. “All I know is that right now, I don’t wanna see you. I don’t wanna talk to you. I want you to _leave.”_

“Come on.” Harry grabs her wrist. “Don’t be like that. Listen to me—”

Sansa wrenches her wrist out of his hand. “Don’t touch me.” 

“She said leave.”

She watches Harry freeze.

“She doesn’t want you to touch her. She doesn’t want you to talk to her. She wants you to leave.” His voice is deceptively calm. Bland. She doesn’t need to turn around to see who it is. “You need to leave.”

Harry’s face reddens.

“No offense, but this isn’t any of your fucking business. Stay out of this.”

“She’s my friend. This is my business.”

Friend. Part of her wants to laugh at the word. The other part is too focused on the way Harry’s eyes narrow between the two of them. 

“This is why you’ve been dodging my calls all night? Seriously?”

Harry steps forward and Sansa is pulled back. Jon is standing in front of her, hand still on her wrist. 

“You need to leave.” He says. “Before I make you leave. Got me?”

Harry’s chest puffs up, and even though he’s taller, he looks almost juvenile compared to Jon, who’s got the hockey player physique—lean and too broad for his own good. For Harry’s own good.

“Harry.” Sansa pulls free. “I want you to leave. We’ll talk tomorrow, but right now—I want you to leave. Please.”

He looks at her, seconds passing. He must be realizing this is his way out, one where he gets to keep his pride and his teeth. He nods, slowly. “Tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow.” She repeats.

She doesn’t dare breathe until he gets in his car. She watches it disappear around the corner, standing there a bit longer than necessary. Sansa doesn’t have to turn around to know that he’s still there. She can feel him. 

“I was handling it.” She says under her breath. 

“That’s not what it looked like to me.”

He has the nerve to sound angry. It sends her spinning on him. “I don’t care about what it looked like to you.” She bites out. “I don’t care about what _you_ think.”

It’s such an obvious lie in her own ears. Maybe in his too. He blinks at her a couple times, jaw tightening.

“This is about what happened downstairs.”

Oh God.

“Fuck off.” Her lower lip trembles and she hates herself for it. “For _one_ second, stop acting like you know everything.”

Sansa doesn’t wait for his reply. She leaves him outside, in the cold. She refuses to give into the urge to stomp upstairs, but the music playing through the house is loud enough that she allows herself to slam the door shut. 

She takes her boots off again, throwing them into her closet hard. She flops down on her bed, something cold jostling around her neck. She reaches down and finds the chain. His chain. She squeezes her eyes shut at the same time her door opens.

Jon is standing in front of her. Again.

“Do you know what a closed door means, or have you taken one too many hits to the head?” Sansa shoots up, fists balled at her side.

He’s got that stupid, stubborn look on his face. The one where his brow is pinched and his jaw is clenched. “You took it wrong. What happened down there.”

“In case you couldn’t tell, I don’t wanna talk about this.”

“Too bad. It’s happening.”

She has never wanted to _scream_ at anyone more in her life.

“You said you’d rather kiss a moose than kiss me.” She hisses. “What other way is there to take that?”

He ducks his head, as if to escape the heat of her glare. “Robb said that.” 

“You made a joke about it.”

“It was a _joke_.” 

“If you didn’t wanna kiss me, you should have just said so.” She snaps. “You didn’t have to make fun of me, and—”

“Of course I wanted to kiss you.”

He says it incredulously, like she had just claimed that the sky isn’t blue, or that birds don’t fly. As if his desire to kiss her is an immovable, irreversible fact. 

Sansa feels small all of the sudden, unsure of nearly everything in the world. Her heart feels like it’s about to jump out of her chest. “Why didn’t you?”

He doesn’t answer. Of course he doesn’t, he isn’t used to people questioning him. Her throat feels incredibly tight. 

“Are you like—” She blinks several times, and very fast. “Embarrassed, or—”

“I’m not embarrassed.” He cuts her off. 

His expression has changed. Shifted. She doesn’t know exactly what’s different, but something must be, because he looks different. Softened at his jagged edges. But she isn’t sure. She isn’t sure of anything when it comes to him. 

“I’m not embarrassed of you,” Jon repeats, a little firmer.

They’re standing extremely close, now. They’re the same height now that she’s not wearing any shoes. Just like downstairs, she feels his fingers reaching out, across that small gap of space, to touch her own. 

She lets them.

“But this isn’t a good idea.” He says at last. “It never has been.”

No. Sansa can admit that to herself, if not anyone else. It isn’t. 

She sniffles. “Robb would probably punch you in the face.”

“Probably.” A weak, half smile curls up at the corners of his mouth like a sticker. “Definitely.”

Sansa reaches up—she isn’t sure what she’s doing until her hand rests against the side of his face. He hasn’t shaved in awhile. 

“It’s a nice face.” 

He looks up at her from underneath his lashes. “It’s alright.”

She traces the curve of his cheekbone. “NHL insured.”

“Something like that.” His mouth twitches.

There are so many things standing between them, even this close. Robb. Her entire family. Chicago. His hockey stick. Her skates. The expectations that rest on both of their shoulders. 

It’s a terrible idea. 

“And with Harry and all…” She clears her throat, moves to pull away.

Unexpectedly, his hands find her wrist, not to grip them, just to keep them from leaving his face. Or going anywhere. 

“Harry’s an idiot.” He says firmly. “You should have let me kick his ass.”

Sansa steels her spine. As if she’s preparing for battle. Or preparing to get knocked around, at the very least. “You’ve never liked him.”

“He was never good enough for you.”

“No one is good enough for me, according to you and Robb.”

He looks at her askance. It’s so fierce that it reminds her of a glare, but his eyes on her mouth gives it all away. “I’m not your brother.”

“Yeah.” She hears herself say. “I know.”

They don’t move. Not closer to each other, not away. This is a tipping point. Whichever way they go—Sansa has a feeling that it depends on her. That she’s gonna have to be the one to make it happen.

She takes his hands, like she did in the car, and places them right on her hips, feels them hot against her skin through the fabric of her dress. She shudders, as if she wasn’t aware she was cold until the moment he touched her.

“I spent hours looking for something to wear after I saw you.” She confesses. “Like—hours. I was so—I just wanted to look nice for you.”

Sansa feels his hands, very subtly, pull her closer. His thumbs run over her hips. 

“You make me nervous too.” She whispers. “I guess—that’s what I’m trying to say. I’m nervous around you too.”

There’s a moment where he doesn’t speak. Where he’s just touching her. Her hips. Her lower back. The circumference of her waist. 

“I like it.” Their noses brush. “I’ve always liked you in blue.”

Her eyes shut. 

“No mistletoe.” She says under her breath.“Or mooses.”

“Shut up.” Jon says, annoyed and gentle and _fond,_ right before he kisses her.

* * *

She remembers the first time they kissed.

It was in the dark, at a party. They must have a thing for parties and darkness. She made the first move, clumsy and determined, and he just sat there, long enough that she almost regretted it, before he started kissing her back. There were snowflakes melting in his hair. His chain was the only thing she could see in the dark. She closed her eyes, tried to picture Waymar Royce—

But all she could see was him. All she could feel was him—

And she didn’t mind it.

Not one bit.

* * *

This kiss is different. 

It’s a relief and it’s hungry and it’s desperate—she’s got his arms looped around his neck and his hands are pressing her so close to him that she can’t tell what’s his and what’s hers in the dark, all she can do is feel feel _feel._

He kisses like he does everything else, ruthlessly, perfectly, with just a little bit of restraint. She doesn’t want it. There’s no place for that in this kiss. She’s waited five years for it, she wants it, needs it exactly how she needs him, recklessly, without abandon. 

She reaches behind him, just to lock the door.

She doesn’t know how they end up on the bed, just that she was the driving force behind it, because he’s sitting down on the edge and she’s still standing up, hovering over him. 

She has to bend her neck to kiss him, which is a little uncomfortable. He pulls her by the hips so that she’s in his lap, just like she was in the car, only things are just a little different. They’re alone, and he’s hard, and she’s straddling his waist, and this is a bad idea. A terrible idea. Probably the worst one she’s had in recent memory—

“I wanna take off my clothes.” She tells him, mouth still against his. 

Jon doesn’t say anything to that, not yet, but he stops kissing her to rest his face in her neck and she wonders if he can hear it, her heart threatening to pound out of her chest. 

“We should stop.” He murmurs against her skin, just as he begins to press a kiss to her pulse and then suck. His hands are running up her thighs. 

“I don’t want you to.” She sounds embarrassingly high pitched in her own ears but she’s way too far gone to care about rectifying that. “I want—”

Jon catches her mouth in his before she can finish that, and she swallows the moan building up in the back of her throat. 

* * *

She remembers the second time they kissed.

Just a few months later, right before one of his hockey games. She had trouble looking him in the face because she wasn’t able to stop staring at his mouth, soft, full, slightly chapped. Every time she saw him, she saw him as the guy walking around with her first kiss.

But not that day.

That day she saw him as human. Vulnerable after the loss the team took last weekend, a huge blow to his pride. It was more than him hating to lose, it was almost like he lost a part of himself. 

They were on the ice. His gloves were underneath his arm and he was gripping his hockey stick as if it would disappear if he let it go and his cheeks were flushed, with cold or because her hands were clasped on either side of his face, she didn’t know, but—

The kiss was brief, but soft. Tender. Sober. Nothing like the last time, but everything like the last time. He kissed her back more immediately.

“I believe in you.” She said afterwards, with their noses still touching. 

He just looked away, saying nothing. She left, because she didn’t want him to feel like he had to.

They won the game that day with an eight point lead.

* * *

He doesn’t take off her clothes.

But he’s got her hand up her dress, underneath her tights and he’s touching her _there_ , over her underwear at first and then beneath, until his fingers are inside of her, nudging at something white hot below her navel. 

Sansa drops her face into his neck, helpless. 

His free hand, gripping her hip, finds the back of her neck, pulls her back so that she’s looking right at him. She’s so close, she can see the curl of his eyelashes. So close, she can see the white of the mostly healed scar cutting through her eyebrow. So close they’re sharing air to breathe. The hilt of his wrist rubs up against her clit. She moans a lot louder than she ought to and a lot quieter than she wants to, and—

His mouth crushes against hers, nipping and devouring, like he’s trying to pull it from her throat and swallow it whole. She comes, legs trembling, world imploding, with his tongue in her mouth, swiping so gently her entire body shudders.

There are tears in her eyes from the sheer force of it all, voice cracking as she asks, “Now can we take our clothes off?”

* * *

She remembers the last time they kissed. 

His knuckles were bloody and his mouth warm but he was cold. His hands. His disposition. Whatever that had been between them for the last few months—

Cold.

“We can’t.” His hands were gentle on her upper arms. That made it even worse, because he cared about her—

But not in that way.

Her eyes burned with tears. “Do you like her more than me?”

He took Alys Karstark to prom. She was on the girl’s team and she did soccer on the side. Everyone at school expected it; they’d known each other forever. 

Sansa had known him twice that long.

“You know I don’t.” He said. “You know how much I like you.”

Part of her knew, maybe. Knew there was more to him beating down the door of the hotel room Edric got them. There had to be, from the way he punched his face in more times than she can count. And hadn’t she been counting on that, when Edric asked her to prom? Hadn’t she wanted this? 

“I don’t know anything about you.” She mumbled. “I just think I do.”

She thought she felt his hand in her hair, but then there was nothing there. “Maybe it’s better that way.”

She was still dizzy from whatever Edric put in her drink. Her head was leaning on her shoulder, even though she didn’t want it to be. 

“I wanted you to ask me.” Her voice wobbled. “I was waiting for you to ask me.”

He didn’t say anything, but his hand was on her lower back, as if that was supposed to comfort her. It made her so angry she wanted to scream.

“I love you.” She said it before she even realized she had, too angry to care. She wanted to know in that moment, more than anything, _doesn’t that count for something?_

She felt him flinch.

As if she struck him, and for a moment, she didn’t breathe. She couldn’t, too convinced if she did, the hurt would come pouring in. 

And maybe she could have taken it, could have accepted it, if he just stayed silent. If he pretended he hadn’t said anything at all. If he had just written her off as too drugged to know what she was saying and decided to not hold it against her. But he didn’t. 

He said, “I know.”

* * *

She’s naked. 

He isn’t. 

Sansa had unzipped her own dress and kicked off her own stockings, undid her own bra. Jon had stopped at his shirt, joggers still hanging low on his hips when she straddles him again. His hand finds her neck, where the chain rests, pulls as she rolls her hips down against him, like she belongs to him, and she does. She always has. 

It occurs to her, as he hovers over her, taking her in for all she is, that this is how it’s always been. Her bare and vulnerable for him, and his stubborn attempt at a compromise. There’s something to be said, probably, about how she’s willing to take his compromise every time, no matter how shitty it is, but at that moment, she doesn’t care, because his mouth is pressing against every inch of her body, rough hands moving down the sides of her thighs. 

There’s a moment, right before he’s inside of her, where he just looks at her in the eyes. He runs his fingers through her hair, nose grazing her. Her thighs are hugging his hips and her heart is beating steadily as she kisses him one more time, softly, hands pressing into his back, urging him closer. 

His arms come down around her, caging her in, but she doesn’t feel trapped. She’s tense at first, at the feel of him moving into her, but then she feels his stubble rubbing against her shoulder, the soft woosh of his breath as one of his hands moves from beside her, to between her legs. 

She loses herself. 

In his hands and his mouth and the feel of him draped over her. She’s weightless, a wayward planet drifting into outer space and he is gravity pulling her back into orbit. The party is gone. The entire world is gone. It’s just them, in this room, underneath the christmas lights strung around the walls. 

It’s different for him. He’s aware of everything, the way her breath hitches when moves into her just right and her eyes fluttering shut when he touches her somewhere that she likes. She knows with a certainty that he is filing it all away, every sound, gasp, and touch. 

She does the same. She presses her mouth against him harder so she can remember the taste, runs her hands over his back so she remembers the contours there, closes her eyes so can savor the feeling that’s tightening her stomach again.

“I’m gonna come again.” She says, more to herself, because she can hardly believe it.

“I know.” He’s been quiet this whole time, save for his heavy breathing.

The orgasm hits her like a brick wall to the face, hard and unexpected. Unlike the first, it sends her spinning out, like she’s skidding out of control after popping a turn. It’s the sound of him cursing, so soft, she almost thinks she imagined it, that brings her back down. The sound of him losing control, all because of her. 

Her hand finds the back of his neck, bringing his mouth up to hers the moment he comes, like he did to her earlier. His hips stutter, teeth catching on her bottom lip. She savors in the sting. 

They lay there for a while. She doesn’t know how long it is before his face leaves the crook of his neck, before the weight of his body leaves hers. Sansa closes her eyes. She wants to stay in this moment awhile longer. She doesn’t want to see him leave. 

But he doesn’t.

Jon settles behind her, arm heavy over her waist. His nose is cold against the back of her neck. She stays perfectly still.

“I told Robb I was leaving.” He mutters against her skin.

Hope is blooming in her chest. She ignores it, pressing her cheek into the pillow. “You should probably go, then.”

“Probably.”

He doesn’t move. 

“It’s snowing, though. You could stay. Just until it stops.”

The snow is coming down a bit harder than when they were outside, but it’s no less harmless. They both know that. They both know that this excuse is flimsy at best. Desperate at worst.

Neither of them care.

“Yeah.” He pulls her closer to him. “Just until it stops.”

Sansa leans into him, finding herself wishing she was in a snow globe after all, so she could stay in this moment forever.


	2. Chapter 2

Sansa spends Valentine’s day with her head in the toilet, puking her guts up.

So hard she chokes and heaves. So hard she grips the sides of the toilet for purchase, eyes watering. After she’s done, she brushes her teeth with a travel kit she hid in her clutch. She dabs her eyes with toilet tissues, thanking god her makeup is waterproof. She also briefly acknowledges the fact that she would rather spend her entire night in this bathroom, than go back outside. 

She goes anyway. 

“You don’t look so good.” Harry frowns at her when she comes back, sitting across from him again. 

“I’m fine.” She gives him a reassuring smile. 

“You’re sure?”

“Yeah. I’m just tired.”

“That’s normal. You’ve been working so hard, lately,” he reaches across the table, threads his fingers through hers. “I’m proud of you.”

“Thanks.” He kisses her cheek, and just for a second, things feel like they used to be between them, when they first started dating.

She talked to Harry after she got back from the US Championships. She was still afloat from talking to the recruiter from the US team and perhaps that’s what made her give him a second chance. 

  
There was also the fact that she was lonely, and the one person she did want to tell about her win was gone—but she only had herself to blame for that. The day after they spent the night together, she had left town without saying goodbye to go compete and he wasn’t there when she came back. She couldn’t help but feel like that was intentional.

  
But when she wished him happy birthday over text on the 27th, he replied _thanks._ And nothing else. So maybe it wasn’t intentional. Then, after she spent an entire weekend obsessing over it, it hit her like a freight train that she was the US junior champion and she was still worried about what Jon Snow thought about her.

She called Harry after that.

Harry pays for dinner and they walk to the car. He ruins the good feeling he gave her back in the restaurant when he starts kissing her before she can get her seatbelt on. Since they’ve gotten back together, he’s given her a wide berth affection wise, but it’s clear on Valentine’s Day that all bets are off. Sansa kisses him back, just once, but he leans into her. It turns into something longer and with the promise of more tongue than she was willing to accept at the moment.

“Stop.” Sansa turns her face. His mouth follows. She pushes at his shoulder gently. “Harry. Stop. I’m not in the mood.”

Harry pulls back, brow creased in confusion. Then it turns to annoyance. “Seriously?”

“I told you I was tired.”

“Yeah, but—I can’t even remember the last time we had sex.”

She can’t either, truthfully, so she just sighs long and hard. “Does it matter?”

“Of course it matters.” Harry scrubs his hand over his face. “I can’t help but feel like this isn’t about you being tired. It’s like—you’re still punishing me, or something.”

  
If she had the energy to slap him, she would have in that moment.   
  


“I just—” Sansa rubs at her eyes. “I don’t even have the capacity for this conversation. It’s like talking to someone with a brick wall for a head. Can you just drive me home?”

Harry stares at her, blinking slowly. Like an old computer chewing on advanced code. He squints. “Are you like—on your period or something?”

Her eyes widen in disbelief. 

” _Are you kidding me?”_

She can tell from the way he just continues to stare at her that he genuinely isn’t.

And she’s just _done._

“Sansa. Get back in the car.” He sighs, when she slams the door shut. 

“I’m walking.” She grips her clutch tight until her knuckles turn white. “Leave me alone.”

“Don’t be ridiculous!”

He’s still idling alongside her as she walks, chin up, towards nowhere in particular. She doesn’t know where she’s going, but just the idea of spending one more second with Harry makes her wanna tear her hair out.

“Don’t be like this, babe. Come on.”

“Harry,” Her jaw is clenched but her voice rises loud enough for everyone to hear. And for once. She doesn’t care. “I would rather jump into busy traffic than get back into a car with you.”

At that, Harry’s face darkens. His mouth twists into a sneer. “Whatever. Suit yourself. Don’t say I didn’t try to help.”

The second his car is gone, nothing but two red tail lights in the dark, Sansa takes her phone out. She orders an Uber, pulling her coat closer around her to fend off the cold. The seafood place she’s stopped beside is wafting the constant scent of fried fish every time the door opens. Her stomach roils again, and she squeezes her eyes shut as if that would chase it away.

_ Are you on your period, or something? _

Her eyes fly open.

Her clutch drops against the concrete, spilling open.

* * *

She’s always been good under pressure. 

Her first grade teacher cooed that she was  _ pragmatic _ after a microwave incident in the teacher’s lounge that resulted in a semi serious fire and her as line leader. When Brienne first started training her, she called her a machine. Her mama called her a diamond, because “that’s what coal turns into with a little pressure,” she’d say, with her Carolina drawl and pageant winning smile. 

She knows what pressure feels like. Knows the feel of the breath of the competition on her neck and the expectation of her parents on her shoulders and the weight of Brienne’s anticipatory gaze—

She understands it well.

But standing in the aisle of a convenience store at midnight, with her hood pulled over her head, face to face with an endless array of nuvarings and prenatal supplements and pregnancy tests—

She doesn’t feel like she’s under pressure.

She feels like her entire world is crashing down around her. 

* * *

Four days. 

She waits four days to actually take the test. 

She’s lost count of how many times she’s read the box over—the labelling and the directions. Five minutes. That’s all it would take for her life to change forever. She needs more time than that. 

Sansa doesn’t even realize what she’s waiting for when there’s a knock on her bedroom door. She doesn’t even bother getting up from her bed to open the door. She just says, very quietly, “Come in.”

“Oh, so you are alive.” Jeyne Poole says sardonically. She shuts the door behind her. “Is your phone up your ass or something? I’ve been calling you.”

Sansa grabs her phone from her nightstand, squinting at it. Five missed calls. 28 texts. She hadn’t heard any of it. 

“We’ve only got three days together before I have to head back.” Jeyne says bossily, flopping onto the bed. “You don’t get to blow me off, birthday girl. I have it all planned. 

_ Birthday.  _ The word disorients her. She checks her phone again, this time for the date. February 19th. In two days, she’ll be 19. 

God. 

She’s only 19. 

And just like that, her world starts crumbling again, debris piling over debris, chest panging and tightening, throat closing. 

“Jeyne.” Her eyes are burning. “I messed up.”

At that, Jeyne frowns, sitting up. “I’m just joking, Sans.” She moves closer to her. “You know I’m not really mad at you.”

“No.” Then a sob breaks free from her throat. “It’s not—I really fucked up. I think…”

I think I might be pregnant, is what she wants to say, but what comes out instead is another sob and then she’s crying, full on and full out and she can’t stop. 

Jeyne’s arms come up around her, holding her close. Sansa hasn’t even told her yet and here she is, reassuring her. “Everything is gonna be alright.” She says, uncertain. “Don’t cry.” “It’ll be okay.” And over and over, Sansa chokes out, “It’s not.” “It won’t be.”

“You’re starting to scare me.” Jeyne admits, and her voice sounds watery and wrong, too. That’s what puts things into perspective for her. Her best friend—her confident, smart, practically fearless best friend, sounding scared. And it’s all because of her. 

Sansa pulls back, inhaling. When she exhales, it comes out shakily. 

“I have to tell you something.”

* * *

It takes an hour for her to explain it all. 

She doesn’t skimp on any details, not on how long she’s been sick, not on Christmas Eve, not on Jon—although after she finishes, she can’t help but feel like she’s betrayed him somehow. Like what happened between them had been something that was theirs, and now it isn’t anymore. But she has bigger things to worry about. 

Jeyne listens, silent, lips pressed thin because she’s fighting against the urge not to say anything. But as soon as she’s finished, she reaches across the bed, pulling the pregnancy test out of the bottom drawer of the nightstand.

Her stomach blanches. “I can’t—”

“Not taking it isn’t gonna make you any less pregnant.” Jeyne says. “At least this way, you know. Okay?”

Sansa notices her hands are shaking, as she holds the box out, so she takes it from her, nodding.

“Okay.” Jeyne lets out an exhale, just as trembling as hers had been earlier. She visibly swallows. “Okay.”

It all seems to happen in slow motion. The trip to the bathroom. Peeing on the stick. Capping it closed. Coming out of the bathroom, hands wet from the sink, shaking from anticipation. She hands the stick to Jeyne, wiping her hands off on her leggings. 

“Five minutes.” Jeyne nods, like a bobble head. “Starting now.”

The time on Jeyne’s phone looms over Sansa’s head like a bobble head. She can’t look at it. She curls up on her bed instead, face down. She breathes in and out. In and out. 

Five minutes. 

She closes her eyes and she’s back there. In the snow globe, underneath him. Feeling his back underneath her hands and the scruff on his cheek against her shoulder and the taste of his mouth on the tip of her tongue. Even now, it doesn’t feel like a mistake.

Five minutes.

She bought a Plan B at the store after he left.

Five minutes.

She downed it with a glass of water. Put her bedding in the washer. 

Five minutes.

She hadn’t seen him again. She’s still got his chain.

The timer goes off. The sound is ugly and and obnoxious and it sends her jolting out of her memories, sitting bolt straight. She clambers for the test—how had she managed to wait four days?

There was nothing.

“It said five minutes at least,” Jeyne points out, chewing on her lower lip. “Let’s give it just one more.”

Jeyne sets her timer again. 59 seconds. 58 seconds.

“I think I’m gonna be sick.” Sansa blurts.

“If you get sick, I’ll get sick.” Jeyne warns her. “Then Theon will have to take care of both of us.”

A laugh, jerky, jagged, and wrong bursts out of her. Jeyne smiles, but it’s tremulous. They’re holding hands. They still are, when the timer closes in on 10 seconds.

She really might be sick.

“I don’t think I can look this time.” Sansa inhales and exhales, nothing is working.

“I’ll look for you.” Jeyne squeezes her hand.

The timer goes off.

Sansa squeezes her eyes shut.

There’s silence, save for just the small shift of test being flipped over from its back to its front. From blissful, safe ignorance, to the terrifying known. 

“Sansa.” And she knows without her having to say it in that moment, because Jeyne sounds so breathless and so frightened and so  _ sorry,  _ that the answer can’t be anything else. She forces herself to open her eyes. Two parallel red lines stare back up at her.

She doesn’t have to look at the box to know what they mean. 

* * *

Sansa spends her 19th birthday feeling like a fraud.

Bran and Rickon turn the kitchen into a radioactive zone trying to make her chocolate chip pancakes for breakfast and Robb sings happy birthday loudly and obnoxiously every time she walks into a room. Arya gets her a gift certificate for kickboxing lessons and her Uncle Benjen gets her a new winter coat. Her mother bakes her a cake and buys sparklers and her father plants a scruffy kiss on the top of her head and they all sing happy birthday to her so lovingly that she wants to throw up again. She doesn’t.

She smiles.

She blows out her candles.

She wonders how long she can keep living this lie.

* * *

She wakes up to a text the next morning.

_ Happy Birthday. Sorry I’m late. _

She laughs at his choice of words. First, it’s just a snort, then she’s gasping for breath in earnest, then she’s crying. And once again, she can’t stop.

Her finger hovers above the call button. 

She blocks him, instead. 

* * *

Starks don’t believe in breaks. 

She’s got about six weeks until Worlds. She wakes up at 6am for practice everyday, and leaves the rink just before it gets dark. This has been her life since she was 11 years old. At this point, it’s muscle memory, and that’s not something you can shake.

The hour she had spent every morning for the past week heaving last night’s dinner into the toilet is skipped past. She takes a cold shower instead, so that she’s trembling like a leaf when she gets out, and wastes no time getting out.

“There she is!” Her mother chirps, when she arrives in the kitchen. “My little future Olympian. Come eat. You’ve got time before you go, don’t you?”

“Not really.” Sansa scans the assortment on the stove skeptically, and opts for an orange. Just to appease her mom. “Brienne’s picking me up soon.”

Her dad is at the sink, rinsing his bowl. He looks over his shoulder at her, brow furrowed. “You’re competing today?” 

“It’s just something small.” 

“Isn’t everything small to you now?” Robb comes in from his morning run, sweating and grinning. “Compared to Worlds? You haven’t even gotten to the olympics yet. Don’t be a snob.”

“Leave your sister alone.” Catelyn pins him with a shrewd look, handing him an empty plate. “Every competition is practice. And practice—”

“Makes perfect.” Sansa finishes. 

Her mother kisses her forehead. “That’s my girl.”

“Whatever it is,” just like that, her father’s attention is on his watch again, “Good luck. I’ve got a meeting. You can tell me all about it when I get home.”

She’s used to this line. It’s just that—a line. And Sansa says her own, playing her part well, as she always has. “Sure Dad.”

“As soon as I drop Rickon off for practice and get Arya to her doctor’s appointment, I’ll be there.” Catelyn promises.

Sansa could tell her not to come, not to worry, and it’d be absolutely pointless. In nine years, Catelyn has only missed three competitions. Her dad only bothers coming to the big ones, but her mother is different. Through every achievement, no matter how big or small, she’s right behind her. 

She can’t help but feel guilty. 

“Okay, mama.” And she hugs her probably tighter than she ought to. The warmth radiating from her makes her eyes water, but she blinks it all away before she pulls back. “I’ll see you there.”

* * *

Sansa barely makes it through her routine. 

She knew she was fading out the moment she skirted onto the ice, and still she smiled so hard her cheeks hurt. She smiled as if that would chase away the black spots dancing around the edges of her vision, as if that would make the ringing in her ears disappear. It took everything in her to keep that smile. But the moment she was off the ice, all bets were off. If Brienne wasn’t waiting for her, she would have fell on her face. 

“I don’t need a hospital.” She mutters now, for the thousandth time. 

It’s bad enough she’s in the nurse’s station, waiting to be fussed over. But Brienne doesn’t see it that way. She keeps going and going. 

“You almost blacked out.” She says incredulously. “You’re barely sitting up now.

“Brienne.”

“Your mom would kill me if I didn’t at least get you a check up.”

Her mom hadn’t been able to make it, something about Rickon getting into a brawl at practice. Sansa had been so relieved when she found out after she came to. But the prospect of her mother knowing that she passed out frightened her so much her throat closed up.

“Brienne.” She says again, pleadingly. 

“The nurse says dehydration, but you haven’t been dehydrated since you were thirteen. You take better care of your body than that.”

She used to.

But this body wasn’t the same body she had two months ago. This body was one that had another growing inside of it, this body was one that heaved up its dinner every morning like clockwork. This body could not handle food or drink, so she stopped taking them altogether.

This body is preparing to be a mother, and her mind is still preparing to be an Olympian.

“It could be something else.” Brienne shakes her head. “Maybe the food poisoning isn’t completely gone. All I’m is the only way to check is to go to the hospital—”

“ _Brienne.”_

She yells it, clearly and loudly and so hard that it hurts. Brienne startles, blue eyes wide, mouth parted.

“I can’t go to the hospital.” She says, voice quavering slightly.

The shock is gone. Brienne raises a challenging eyebrow. “Why not?”

And how does she say something like this to her? The woman who had thrown everything into her, worked dawn to dusk with her, wiped her tears away and built her up until she was the best she could be? How do you tell someone like that how badly you’ve fucked up?

Sansa plucks at the sleeve of her costume, not meeting her eyes. “I never had food poisoning.”

She can feel Brienne’s eyes stay on her for a very long time. 

“How far along are you?” She doesn’t sound disappointed, or angry; she doesn’t sound anything but exhausted.

“Six weeks.” Sansa answers smally. “I think.”

“You’ve got Worlds at the end of March.”

“I know.”

“You cannot compete for the US team three months pregnant. 

She looks up at her finally, jaw clenched and eyes burning. “I  _ know.” _

“Do you?” Brienne crosses her arms over her chest.

Sansa takes a shaky breath.

“This is your life. I’m not gonna lecture you. But I’m not letting  _ this _ —” She gestures around them, at the nurse’s station. “happen again. I care about you too much to let you run away from your problems and risk hurting yourself in the process. Okay?”

Sansa presses the heels of her hands to her eyes. “I’m not trying to hurt myself, I just—”

_ I need time, _ she wants to shout.  _ I need everything to stop.  _ She needs everything to just pause for a moment, while she catches her breath. Her entire life is in flames and she is still in the building, trying to salvage what she can before it turns to ash. 

“You’ve got a decision to make.” Brienne says, not unkindly. “And I’ll support you. Whichever way you go. But you’ve gotta make it. Understand?”

A decision. She makes it sound so simple. As if she isn’t making a decision that could affect the rest of her life. It isn’t just between skating and motherhood, it’s between her family and motherhood. Their love and her love for this child growing inside of her. 

“I don’t even know how to make an appointment without my mom knowing.” She chokes out, throat closing up.

“I’ll help you.” Brienne pulls her close. I’ll always be here to help you.”

She believes her.

* * *

Sansa makes her decision in a Planned Parenthood 45 minutes out of town. 

She’s handed a consent form like it’s a magazine questionnaire, with a beaming smile and a simpering, “If you need any help, just let me know.” She doesn’t. It’s easy enough to fill out. Her name. Her date of birth. Her age. There are a whole bunch of risks and hazards that she skims right over. Blood clots in lungs. Allergic reactions. Hemorrhaging. Strangely enough, she feels nothing reading these words. She ticks every box. Initials every line. Scans the final paragraph, before she freezes. 

_ I understand that my doctor _________ (print the name of your doctor) is going to perform an abortion on me, which will end my pregnancy and result in the death of my fetus.  _

Her fetus.

_ Hers.  _

“Here.” Sansa gives one last initial, before handing it to Brienne. “You have to sign, too. Since you have to take me home.”

She nods shrewdly, taking the clipboard and pen, ticking boxes and signing lines like it’s just nothing at all.

But it  _ is  _ something.

She realizes this in the counselor’s office, something required for all teen mothers before they undergo the procedure. A mother. That’s what she is, now. And the fetus—the baby growing in her stomach—belongs to her. Is literally a part of her.

This is all that’s running through her mind, as the counselor keeps asking her these questions, about her history with depression, and if she has a support system, and—

“Do you have any interest in being a mother?”

The answer hits her like a weighted blanket. 

How many times had she dreamed of it all? The white picket fence with the two and a half kids and a loving husband? How many times had she looked at her parents and knew with a certainty that that was something that she wanted for herself?

“Yes.” She croaks.

The counselor smiles. Dr. Dayne, her name tag reads. “I hope you know that’s still an option after this.”

After. That was the whole point of this, wasn’t it? The after. After this, things would go back to normal. After this, she’d go to Worlds and her family would never know what happened. After this, she’d be an Olympian. 

But after this, she would never be a mother.

She knows it with certainty. She would never fully get over the guilt that would come from this, the feeling that she failed this baby. It’d follow her everywhere. 

“No.” She says, voice hoarse. “It won’t be.”

* * *

“Are you disappointed in me?” 

She can’t help ask Brienne the question in the car as the clinic shrinks from view. 

It’s a long drive home. Sansa feels guilty for making her come all the way out here with her, but Brienne doesn’t seem angry at all. Just silent, and thoughtful.

“You’re doing what’s best for you, Sansa.” She says. “And that’s all I’ve ever wanted you to do.”

Relief loosens her chest and she exhales, feeling just a little bit lighter. “And I can still skate.” She says. “Right? After I have the baby?”

Brienne doesn’t say anything.

Dread starts to build inside of her. She grounds her jaw against it. “Right?” She repeats.

“Anything is possible for you when you put your mind to it, Sansa. I have every confidence you’ll be able to do it.” Brienne says, at last. Then she looks at her, dark blue eyes searching. “But I want you to think about it. Will you be skating for yourself, or will you be skating for your parents?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Sansa snaps, without meaning to.

Brienne takes no offense, simply stares ahead at the road. “It means what I said. Think about it. Was being an Olympian ever your dream, or was it your parents?”

“My parents don’t—live through me, or whatever it is you’re trying to say. They just want me to be happy. That’s all.”

She thinks of her mom, and how she’s been there every step of the way, and her dad, and all the money he’s poured into her coaches and her costumes, and how proud of her he is when he actually does come to her competitions. He calls her champ, and he kisses her on top of her head, and her mom tells her she can have whatever she wants for dinner.

They’re her parents.

They  _ love  _ her. 

“That isn’t something I doubt, Sansa.” Brienne says. “And I think that whether you keep skating or you don’t, they’ll be right behind you. But right now, you need to worry more about telling them the truth. And Harry.”

Just the thought of doing so makes her cold all over, especially the last part. She shuts her eyes. 

“Not Harry.” She mumbles.

“I’ve never liked him, but—” Brienne sighs. “He has a right to know, Sansa.

“No he doesn’t.” And then, very quietly, she adds, “It’s not his.”

* * *

She knows what she has to do.

She’s fully prepared to do it when Brienne drops her off, but her father is at a club meeting, according to a note on the refrigerator and her mother is on the phone with Aunt Lysa. She smiles at her when she comes in, and Sansa decides that she will take this one last moment of normal, before everything changes forever. 

Bran is in the living room, having fallen asleep watching TV, and Rickon is drawing on his face in deep concentration with a black sharpie. On her way to her room, she notices Arya’s door cracked and spies her and Gendry playing video games, elbowing each other. Sansa finds herself knocking on Robb’s door, cheek against the wood. 

“Come in.”

He’s laying in his bed, typing something on his phone. His left leg is elevated and he’s wearing a knee brace. 

“What happened there?” Sansa asks. 

“My fucking ACL.” He mutters. “Again.”

As a skater, she had been trained to believe her body was a temple. Hockey players treated their bodies like battering rams, all in the name of a little black circle on the ice. She never saw the appeal. But she knows how much it means to Robb.

“Do you need anything?” She asks.

His eyes squint in suspicion. “Did mom tell you to come check on me?” 

They used to be a lot closer admittedly, back when they were kids. When it was just them two and Arya, and all they had for entertainment was each other. Even when they parted ways, Robb with hockey and her with her figure skating, she still thought of him as her best friend. There was no one in the world cooler than her big brother. There was nothing in the world he couldn’t protect her from. 

She just really needs her big brother right about now. 

Samsa climbs into bed on her right side, like she used to when they were little, and she had nightmares about silly things. In the dark, he would tell her stories that made her laugh and stories that made her cry. 

Now, it’s her turn to tell him one, because she knows she can’t face their parents without him. 

“You’re being weird.” He says, but he says it affectionately, with a hint of worry. His head finds her shoulder. “What’s up?”

“I really need your help.” She confesses. 

And then she tells him what she can, about the test, and her competition, and the clinic and by the time she’s done, she’s crying yet again, but somehow she feels lighter inside, because her big brother is holding her like he always has, not yelling at her, or pushing her away. 

“It’s gonna be okay.” Robb says into her ear, so confidently like he does everything else. “It’s all gonna be okay.”

* * *

But when the next evening came, she had a hard time believing him. 

Her mother shouts her throat hoarse at her, not even Robb’s attempts to calm her don’t work. Her dad just sits there, as if he’s dazed and can’t quite remember where he is or even who he is. When he does finally speak, it’s when her mother is sitting down with her head in her hands. 

“It’s not Harry’s?”

“No.” She answers. 

Her father’s brow creases in confusion. “Were you…” he stops. “Did something happen? Were you forced?”

“No, Dad.” She feels heat rush to her face. “I wasn’t forced.”

“Who is he? The father?”

She decided before she walked into Robb’s room that she would not tell them about Jon. There was no telling how her parents would react to that, and most importantly, Robb. She doesn’t want to lose him over it. And she doesn’t want Jon to lose him, either.

She lies. “I don’t know.”

At that, Ned covers his face with his hands, sigh muffled against his palms.

Catelyn isn’t nearly finished.

“I wanted better for you. More than I had." Her voice shakes. “I _gave_ that to you. And you’re just—throwing it all away.”

“Cat.” Ned says.

“No. She doesn’t know what we went through. She doesn’t _understand_.” Her mother glares at her accusingly. “Do you even know what being a single mother entails? And so young? I was lucky! I had your father. I wasn’t alone. You’re going to be doing this alone—and for the rest of your life. That’s what being a mother is. It’s a lifelong commitment.”

“She won’t be alone.” Robb argues. “Just like you weren’t. She has us. Right?”

Neither of her parents say anything.

“You always have us.” Ned says, at last. He looks at her, gravely, but earnestly, and she knows that he’s telling the truth. “You should never doubt that.”

Catelyn shakes her head, once, then twice, before standing up and leaving the room completely. 

“Cat.” Ned calls out. 

She doesn’t reply, but the door slams shut. 

Her father comes up to her, and he has never looked so old. It makes her feel more guilty than she ever has. It almost makes her wish she hadn’t left that clinic so soon. 

“It’s gonna take time.” He says, but he kisses her forehead. “But you have to understand....this isn’t what we wanted for you.”

Sansa nods mutely, feeling a hairsbreadth away from shattering, and her father squeezes her shoulder, as if he knows that, as if he’s trying to glue her back into place with his hands. 

“They’ll come around.” Robb says, pulling her close to him. “Dad’s already halfway there. It’s like he said. They need time. Especially mom. You know how she is.”

And she does, but that doesn’t make it hurt any less.

* * *

Her mother doesn’t talk to her for days.

Everywhere she is, her mother is not. Her laundry still gets done and put away and her meals are still made but it might as well have been done by a ghost. Every time Sansa tries to thank her for these things, she just nods, and somehow that’s more worse than not saying anything at all.

It’s March. She should be at Worlds, but she’s going to her first ultrasound instead. Her father takes her; he  even took off from work early. He came around surprisingly quick, since he was notorious for holding grudges. But it was like her Uncle Benjen said—it’s about knowing which grudges are worth holding. She’s glad her father decided this one wasn’t. Robb comes along, too.

Dr. Luwin—the same doctor that delivered her—smears warm gel over her stomach as Robb holds her hand. He places the wand above her navel, smoothing over it repeatedly. 

“There you are.” He murmurs with satisfaction. 

In the center of an oblong circle of black is a distinct gray shape, the size of two robust tomatoes put together. But it isn’t so clearly shaped. She doesn’t know what she was expecting before she came, had been too afraid to do her research, but she hadn’t been expecting something so big. And she definitely didn’t expect it to be moving.

“Holy shit.” Robb breathes.

“Do you see him, sweetheart?” Her father asks her, grabbing her other hand. “That’s his head, right there. And his arms and his legs. That’s our boy.”

_ Our boy.  _

He says it so proudly, so lovingly, that it brings tears to her eyes. She could count on one hand how many times her father had been proud of her, and now she can count her child as one of them. Her son.

“You can tell he’s a boy?” She says, breathless with wonder.

“Of course we can.” Robb nods toward the screen. “His head is huge.”

“I hate to break it to you son, but big heads are not exclusive in male fetuses.” Dr. Luwin says. “Your father is probably going off his ridiculous superstitions.”

“Your gran had all boys, and your mother had only two girls. And I predicted every single one.” Ned thumps the screen. “That’s a boy. That’s a hockey player, right there.”

“Or a figure skater.” She says, more to herself, but Robb hears her, and kisses her cheek. 

“Or a figure skater.” He agrees.

“You’ll know soon enough, Little Carrot.” Dr. Luwin assures her.

Little Carrot. It’s the name he gave her when she was first born, and it was the same name he called her every time they saw each other, at holiday parties or in the grocery store. She had been Little Carrot for 19 years now, and now Little Carrot would be having a smaller carrot. 

She holds her breath while Dr. Luwin takes pictures, and turns on her side so he can get every angle. And she waits for then to be printed out. Most are for the hospital records, but she keeps two for herself.

She’s so excited, that she forgets her mother isn’t talking to her completely until she gets home and finds her standing in the kitchen. She nearly freezes, pivoting on her heel to go back upstairs, but today she’s hopeful. And maybe today, her mother would be merciful. Tentatively, Sansa comes up to stand beside her. Catelyn stills for a second max. Then she sighs, and continues scrubbing the plate in her hand.

“I’m back.” She says. 

Her mother just purses her lips.

“I saw him. He was bigger than I thought he’d be.” She tries for a smile. “Dad thinks he’s a boy. And you always said he was good at predicting it.”

Another sigh. 

More scrubbing.

“He was moving around so much, Dr. Luwin had to retake a bunch of pictures.” She swallows around the lump in her throat. “I brought you one.”

She holds it up to the light coming from the window, so it’s easy for her to see. Her mother’s gaze flickers towards it once, then twice. For a long beat, she stands there, staring, and Sansa holds her breath, hopeful. But Catelyn just shakes her head, and scrubs even harder. 

“Mommy, please.” And now she’s begging, like she has never begged for anything else. “I said I was sorry. I really am sorry.” 

There’s a sharp, jagged like intake of breath, and the plate in her hand drops to the bottom of the seat, breaking. Like she broke her mother’s heart. Like her mother is breaking hers right now.

She turns to face her, and Sansa realizes, like a stab to the gut, that she’s crying too. She opens her mouth, as if to say something.

But she closes it right back, before shaking her head. She leaves the room, with the water still running.

* * *

Arya comes into her room that night. She had skipped dinner, pleading nausea, when she just didn’t want to watch her mother blatantly ignore her while everyone else pretended not to notice. 

Arya slips into her bed, like she had slipped into Robb’s the other day. They lay facing each other, almost nose to nose.

“Can I see?” She asks. 

Sansa pulls her shirt up to reveal her stomach. It’s not quite protruding, but somehow it looks different to her. Feels different. Arya puts her hand there, and she watches her. 

“Am I huge?” She asks.

“Not yet. Can’t even see anything.”

“I feel huge.”

Arya snorts. “Remember how mom looked with Rickon? That was huge.”

“That was super huge.” Sansa agrees, wistful.

“I hope you get that huge.” She pauses. “I would enjoy that very much.”

For the first time in days, Sansa laughs. “What?”

“You’re right. I’m asking for too much. You always get off easy. I’ll take any amount of swelling I can get from you.” Then she sighs, exaggeratedly dreamy. “No more worrying about my friends hitting on you—”

“They do not _hit_ on me. They’re friendly.”

“No more worrying about all the assistant coaches at the rink asking you—”

“Gross.”

“No more worrying about Gendry cheating on me with you—“

“What?” Sansa all but squawks. 

“I have nightmares sometimes.” Arya confesses. “Curse of an overactive imagination.”

“Gendry’s in love with you. You do know that?”

“So he says. Boys lie all the time.”

“Yeah.” She touches the silver chain underneath her pillow. “Boys suck.”

“Speaking of boys,” she moves closer to her in the dark, “It really isn’t Harry’s?”

Her and Harry haven’t spoken since Valentine’s day. She blocked his number not long after. He’s come by three times since then, and each time, Robb has scared him off. She hasn’t seen him in weeks. She thinks,  _ hopes,  _ he’s lost interest. The chase was only so fun when you’re the only one playint

“Nope.” Sansa answers.

“Thank god.” Arya says, sounding so relieved that she has to laugh. And then they’re both laughing. 

“I hope its a girl.” Arya murmurs, after their laughter dies. “That would probably make Mommy really happy.”

The lump in her throat is present more than ever, at the second mention of her mother. She wraps her arms around herself. 

“I showed her the ultrasound today and she cried.” She mumbles. “They weren’t tears of joy.”

“She cries every night, now. I hear her.”

Sansa squeezes her eyes closed against the image. She is so tired of crying, but when Arya’s arms come up around her, she finds she doesn’t have a choice, anymore. 

“I hear you cry too.” She whispers.

* * *

Sansa isn’t sure how the rest of her siblings found out she was pregnant. She wouldn’t be surprised if they found out when her mother was screaming at her the other night. She wouldn’t be surprised if her father had them huddle up and explained it to them like he would a play before a game. She also wouldn’t be surprised if Robb threatened them and told them to be nice about it. Whatever happened, they aren’t weird about it. 

Almost.

Rickon has taken to barging into her room everyday before school and asking “Is he kicking yet?” to which she gives him the same answer every single time: “No.” The answer never discourages him, which is unfortunate for her door. If he keeps going, she’s not gonna have one.

He also likes to  _ talk  _ to her stomach a lot. He has entire conversations with it. He talks about the trials and tribulations of sixth grade and how important it is that he understands that the Flyers are the best hockey team on the planet. 

“Dude, he can’t freaking hear yet.” Bran says, fed up one day. “He barely has ears.”

“You don’t know that.” Rickon argues. 

“I know more than you.” Bran retorts. “I actually read.”

Bran does do a lot of reading and it’s exactly why he believes himself, aside from their parents, to be the expert on all things baby related and is the first one to tell her something she can or can’t do.  _ Sansa shouldn’t be eating sushi. She’s pregnant. Sansa shouldn’t be drinking anything with caffeine. She’s pregnant. Sansa shouldn’t be walking so much. Her feet already look huge. Sansa— _

On and on it goes. Very endearing, but also very matter of fact and incredibly irritating. She wants to tear her hair out, half of the time.

Robb is worse, treating her like she’s fragile and hovering over her like she could be flattened by an asteroid at any minute. At first, she was annoyed by it, but as she got bigger she became more grateful. He never complained when she asked him for anything, and between her back pain and her cravings, she asked him for a lot. 

“Are you gonna hide in the house your entire pregnancy?” Robb asks her one day. 

He offered to take her to get frozen yogurt, but she declined. It’s April and she has a bump now, though she gets away with covering it up easily enough. Soon, it would be summer, and she wouldn’t be able to walk out the house wearing large coats without looking crazy. 

“Everyone’s gonna find out at some point, you know.” He says. “No one’s gonna judge you. I won’t let them.”

It wasn’t the judging she was worried about. Lyanna Snow lives just a block away from them, now, and it would only take one chance encounter for her to find out, and when she found out, she would tell Jon and if she told Jon—

She can’t even think about that.

“I know.” She says. “I just don’t wanna spend this time worrying about what other people think. I’ve got one focus right now, and it’s him.”

Robb nods, like he understands, before kissing her cheek to go get dressed, and she really hopes that that’s the end of it. 

* * *

Dressing to hide a pregnancy should be considered an art form. 

It means a lot of loose fitting clothes and specially made maternity sweaters she orders online. It means wearing a coat that’s twice her size, buttoned all the way to the top. It means hiding her face with her hair around her shoulders, because there are days she looks so swollen that she forgets what she used to look like. 

“Dad.” She calls out, making her way downstairs. “I’m ready.”

Robb is waiting for her at the bottom, and he’s smiling. It looks strained, and it takes her only a moment to realize why. 

Their mother is standing right behind him, purse over her shoulder and car keys in hand.

“Dad’s got a meeting today.” He says, too brightly. “He couldn’t cancel. Mom offered to take you.”

Sansa didn’t know that there was a meeting her father couldn’t cancel. 

But she noticed the look in Robb’s eye, that hopeful, desperate look and she noticed that her mother was looking at her instead of around her and she understood that it was more than likely her father didn’t have a meeting at all. 

She’s waited 11 weeks for this—an opening of some kind that would hopefully lead to them being something similar to the way they once were. But now that it’s here, Sansa doesn’t quite know what to do with it.

“Are you still coming?” She asks Robb, prepared to plead.

“Of course.” Then he grins at her. “Bran owes me money if it’s a boy.”

Her mother clears her throat. “We don’t want to be late.”

So they all get into the car, and drive to the hospital. Robb sits in the front and she sits in the back, face turned to the window, rubbing her belly. She decides she won’t be the first one to say something, and her mother doesn’t say anything at all.

“I’ll be damned.” Dr. Luwin says, mouth creased at the corners as he smooths the wand over her belly, just like he did last time.

“What?” Sansa nearly sits up in her anxiety, but Robb coaxes her back down.

“It’s a boy.”

It’s her mother who says it, eyes shining with tears as she stares at the monitor. Then she looks at her. For the first time in months, she really looks at her. Not with disappointment, or frustration, or sadness, but—

A little like she used to. 

“Tell your husband I said he’s a damn bastard.” Dr. Luwin grumbles. 

He take the pictures, turning her onto her side and asking her hold her breath while complaining all the while. “No science. I don’t know how he does it.” He mutters, and he leaves afterward to go talk to a nurse. Robb leaves to call their father and most importantly, Bran, and that just leaves Sansa alone with her mother for the first time since her last ultrasound. 

Her mother begins to cry. 

“Mom.” She whispers, because she broke the silence between them first, and if her mother is willing to meet her halfway, then so is she. “It’s okay.”

“It isn’t.” She says, and Sansa is so relieved that she said it because even though she was willing to accept it for the sake of their relationship, it still would have stung going down. “I’m sorry.” She wraps her arms around her. “I’m so sorry.”

Sansa buries her face into her shoulder, and closes her eyes. She apologizes again, just as she apologized several times before, but this time is different. This time, her mother tells her there’s nothing to be sorry for, and holds her just as tight. 

* * *

On the drive back home, Sansa sits in the front, and her mother holds her hand. She is so relieved that she is exhausted. She had not realized how much work being upset with someone took. She was usually so quick to forgive. 

Robb is the first to take off from the car, eager to rub everything in Bran’s face, but they stay in the car for a while, sitting in their silence. 

Catelyn is the first one to break it. 

“Being a mother...it’s the greatest thing that’s ever happened to me. Everyday I thank god for you and your sister and your brothers. And if I had to go back and do it all over again, I’d choose you guys every time.”

She feels the ‘but’ at the end, silent and tangible. Like an armadillo poking out of it’s shell. 

“But I wouldn’t have chosen this for you.”

Sansa swallows. “I understand.”

“As a mother, you don’t ever want your child to feel pain, or struggle, and that’s what being a mother so young is. It’s a hell of a struggle and…” She shakes her head. “I just wanted you to live your life a bit more. I wanted you to see the world and win medals and kiss boys. I didn’t want you to make my same mistake.”

“But I did, Mom.” Sansa says, throat tight. “And there’s nothing more we can do about it now.”

Her mother closes her eyes, but she doesn’t pull away. 

That gives her the courage to continue. 

“And just because I am a mother, doesn’t mean that’s all I have to be. I can still go to school and—I can still figure things out.”

For the first time since she was in the car with Brienne, she thinks about life after her pregnancy. Life with her son. Maybe she would still skate. Maybe she’d just go to school. Maybe she’d do something else different entirely. But it was like Brienne said, she could do anything as long as she set her mind to it. 

“And you will.” Catelyn smiles waterily, and presses a kiss to her forehead. “I believe in you.”

* * *

June comes.

So do the Stanley Cup Finals. 

Everyone else goes down to the rink to watch the game. The Flyers didn’t even make it to the finals, but no one is thinking about that, today. Today, they’re thinking about him. 

It doesn’t matter that he plays for Chicago. In Winterfell’s eyes, he’ll always be one of theirs. So they gather at the rink, the very same rink he learned to skate at, the very same rink he trained at every single day, to watch him. To cheer him on.

Sansa stays home. 

She’s huge and very noticeable now, so that provides a good enough excuse for her family. Anything else wouldn’t do in their eyes. The finals were like a second Christmas to the Starks, but seeing as her first Christmas ended up with her underneath one of the most promising hockey players in the last decade, she thinks it better not to celebrate at all. 

Her mother is the only one to stay behind with her. South Carolina born, she preferred football over hockey and at that moment, Sansa could not love her more for it. They sit up in bed together and watch the Real Housewives of Orange County reruns instead, and paint their nails. Her mother paints her toes since she can’t reach them over her belly. Both are sufficient distractions. 

Until they aren’t.

There are days that she is so close to breaking that she almost calls him just to hear his voice. She thinks about him picking up and saying _Hey_ in that tone he always does that is specifically reserved for her—cautious and gentle, like he’s afraid of breaking her. She would tell him how much she missed him and he would do the same. And then she would tell him everything—

  
And then what?

That’s where the fantasy ends and she realizes that it’s just that: a fantasy. It’s what stops her every single time. The unpredictability of him has always been something that has intrigued her, no matter how many times it’s gotten her stung, but that was when it was just her. Soon, it won’t be just her. And she can’t afford to have her son sitting and waiting for his father to come around just like she did. 

“All done.” Catelyn blows on her toe nails. “Winterfell blue.”

Downstairs, the door crashes open, shouts coming up the stairs. Her mother sighs, turning up the TV a little louder. 

“Sounds like Jon won.”

She’ll learn later that it was a tie down to the very last minute, when he broke through the defense and scored into goal, but at that moment, she bites her tongue and resists the urge to tell her that she knew. That she always knew.

She rubs her stomach instead.

* * *

The night she goes into a labor is a complete blur. 

She remembers pain. She remembers waking up to it, before stumbling to the bathroom and falling onto her knees. She remembers staying there for a long time, trying to breathe her pain in and out, willing the contractions to subside. She remembers assuming they were fake and waiting them out, not bothering to even count the seconds between.

She remembers Robb finding her, his hands on her back, shaking her gently, but no less frantically. His hand warm on her face, his mouth moving, but her being too gone on the pain to make anything of it until finally, the pain subsides once more and she is just barely able to croak out, “I’m fine.”

And she remembers trying to sit up and looking down at her sweatpants to find the crotch and between her thighs wet and she remembers Robb’s face when he saw it too, the way it paled like paper until his jaw clenched and he said:

“We’ve gotta get you to the hospital.”

* * *

She remembers repeating herself a lot, too. 

“It’s too early.” She said, over and over again as Arya helped her dress quickly. 

Three weeks. She wasn’t supposed to be due for another three weeks and she was going into labor now. She remembers being so scared for her boy. When she said it again in the car, with her head in Bran’s lap, he stroked her hair and told her not to worry, that everything would be fine. And that made her feel a little better, because Bran was always right. 

“Where are Mom and Dad?” She asked each of them, more than once. Their answers varied little. “They’re on their way.” “They’re coming.” “They’ll be here.”

But they weren’t, and wouldn’t be for awhile. Even if they left Rickon’s game when they were supposed to, they’d still be stuck in traffic. They wouldn’t be there for at least an hour, and the thought started to make her anxious.

“Don’t leave me.” She said to Robb, as a nurse rolled her into the hospital after helping her into a wheelchair. Arya went to go park the car and Robb carried her into the emergency room, and she held onto his hand in a death grip, as if that would make the pain go away. She must have said it half a hundred times, but each time, he reassured her, “I’m not going anywhere.”

“I’m scared,” Her shoulders were trembling and she didn’t know who she was talking to, the nurses or Robb or Bran or Arya—but she couldn’t stop saying them. As if she was possessed, or something.

The nurses told her not to worry and Bran started listing all the low mortality statistics for first time young mothers and Arya stuck her head between her knees like she was gonna be nauseous but Robb was right there, gripping her hand, never leaving her side.

He said, “Me too.”

That shouldn’t have made her feel better, but it did.

* * *

She remembers when her parents came. She remembers that her mother was crying and must have apologized a million times and her father was frightening the nurses with all of his sharp questions and the rest is admittedly a bit hazy, because the epidural had made her drowsy and the most she could feel of her contractions was an increasing pressure. 

“Dr. Luwin will be here soon.” Her mother said to her, as she ran her fingers through the hair. “And so will our boy.”

She remembers in that moment, wanting to tell her  _ my boy,  _ because it was so startlingly clear in that moment, more than ever, that even with her family around her, she was completely alone. And she would be when she left there. Would the next 18 years be any different? It hurt to think about it. 

“Is there anything you need?” 

Of course, she was aware that her mother was probably talking about ice chips or extra pillows or a bottle of water, but she could only think of one thing that she needed. One thing that she wanted, above all else.

“Jon.” She heard herself mumble. “I want Jon.”

And she remembers the way her mother looked at her in that moment, blank and uncomprehending—or maybe she was simply refusing to comprehend—before her father and Robb came back in, with more pillows and blankets.

And she acted as if she hadn’t said anything at all.

* * *

She remembers the actual labor being a real bitch.

They took her off the epidural right before, because she wasn’t responsive enough to the contractions. Most of it was pure pain. She remembers Dr. Luwin telling her to scream. She remembers him telling her to push. She remembers doing all of these things and telling him to do his fucking job and get her baby out of her. 

She remembers him  _ laughing  _ and saying, “I don’t think I’ve ever actually heard you curse, Little Carrot.”

She remembers both her mother and her brother being at her side, and she remembers the contrast of their red hair against the blue scrubs they wore and she remembers her mother telling her she’s never been prouder but most importantly she remembers Robb at her side. 

“I can’t do this.” She must have told him, over and over again. 

And he cut her off each time, voice firm and hands gentle, “Yes, you can.” 

And she did. 

It felt like she pushed for hours until Dr. Luwin was declaring that he could see the head and he told her she was  _ almost  _ there, so she pushed again because she wanted so badly to be all the way there. She wanted the pain to be gone and she wanted her son in her arms so she pushed. 

She remembers the sound of his first cry, high pitched and squalling, cutting through the air like a sharp knife as she slumped in relief. She remembers her mother crying, too, kissing her forehead and she remembers her brother giving her hand one last squeeze and she remembers Dr. Luwin crying out, “Look at these long limbs, he’s like a little monkey!”

To that, she remembers saying, very faintly,“Robb.” 

“I’m here.” Her brother said, and his face was above her again, hand in hers. 

“No.” And for the first time in 18 hours, she smiled as she took his hand in hers. “I mean his name is Robb.”

And her brother, the bravest, strongest, foolish, most stereotypically masculine man she knew, actually cried.

* * *

The first time she holds him, she never wants to let go. 

He’s red faced, patchy, and tearful, but he is hers and she can’t stop marveling at the fact. Can’t stop tracing his tiny nose and lips. Can’t stop feeling his heartbeat underneath the swaddle if blankets, up against her thumb. She doesn’t want to sleep. She doesn’t want to eat. She just wants to hold him.

But her mother forces her to do all those things, and Sansa agreed because the bassinet is right beside her bed, so she can look at him and touch him anytime she wants.

“He’s so small.” Rickon says in amazement, touching his little palm.

“He’s beautiful.” Her mother says. She’s holding him in her arms. She does it perfectly, head supported, body to her chest. Of course she does. But Sansa still finds it hard to let anyone hold him without fearing they’ll drop him.

The door to her hospital room might as well be revolving. There is a constant stream of guests, her uncles and her brothers and her sister and Jeyne and her parents—a wheel full of people who love her rotating and showing her that they do. 

“I can’t believe you got so much chocolate.” Jeyne says, sitting by her bed. 

“Take half of it.” Sansa tells her. “It’ll be too tempting to just sit around and eat it all.”

Jeyne pokes her finger into the bassinet, touching little Robb’s small nose before kissing it. “I should have been here.”

“You were supposed to.” Sansa sighs. “It’s not your fault he came three weeks before his due date.”

“Shouldn’t he be like—in a box, or something? He isn’t premature?”

“Dr. Luwin says he’s perfectly healthy. But a week earlier would have been a different story.”

She remembers the dread she felt on the way to the hospital. She decided that that was the worst feeling in the world, worrying about her son’s safety, and she knew she’d do anything to never feel it again.

“Hey.” Jeyne pins her with knowing, steely look. “Stop that. It could have happened to anyone.”

“You’re just saying that. You’re not a doctor.”

“Maybe I’ll become one to shut you up.”

Then she gives the baby one of her stern looks. “Don’t repeat that. Ever. Not until you're 40. Aunt Jeyne has a potty mouth, Robbie. You’re gonna have to do as I say and not as I do.”

And that’s the moment that baby Robb became Robbie.

* * *

Sansa is discharged, and she quickly learns that being a mother in a hospital is different from being a mother at home.

There are no nurses to come to Robbie’s aid when he starts crying in the middle of the night, there’s just her. And there’s no one to show her how to use the complimentary breast pump they gave her and there’s no one who tells her how to get him to stop crying long enough to get him to latch—

There’s no one. Just her.

Her family is there, but she knows it isn’t fair to ask them for too much. Having this baby was her decision, not hers, and they shouldn’t have to pay for it.  There’s also a small part of her that can’t help but feel like she’s being tested by her mother. Paranoia is a symptom of post pregnancy brain, but it’s also a great motivator and she more than leans into it.

She reads a lot of articles and books, and she acquires a new fear every single day. SIDS. Colic. Asthma. Most nights, she sits by Robbie’s crib, watching him breathe. On the nights she doesn’t, he wakes her up crying and she is immediately awake again, rocking him, and feeling like the worst mother in the world because she had dared to close her eyes. Her entire life becomes diaper changes, breast pumps, and the rise and fall of Robbie’s little chest. 

That’s when her mother and Robb step in, insisting that she needs a break. They start watching Robbie during the afternoon, and in the beginning, she uses that time for important things, like showering and washing clothes and cleaning her room. But one day, she decides to use that time to sleep and from then on, that’s all she does during her afternoons.

If she isn’t sleeping, she’s curled up and staring at the ceiling. If she isn’t sleeping, she’s thinking of SIDS, colic, and asthma. If she isn’t sleeping—

She’s thinking of him.

It gets worse as time passes. In the first month, her thoughts are only fleeting, but in the second month, hockey season arrives and the only way she can escape him is by sitting in a room without any internet at all, and in the third month, she can’t escape him at all, because every time she looks at her boy, he is all she sees. 

The sparse hair that is beginning to sprout all over his head is dark brown, and his eyes, which had been blue in the first month, are so dark that they change in different lighting. Sometimes they’re pitch. Sometimes they’re gray. But at all times, they are his. There are days when she looks at him and cries and there are days she can’t look at him at all.

There’s a game the week before Christmas—Wildlings vs Capitals. One day, after her afternoon nap, she finds Arya on the couch with Robbie. They’re watching the highlights. 

“What are you doing?” She asks a little too loudly. 

“I missed the game last night.” Arya shrugs. “Jon played—”

“I don’t want him watching that.” She snaps. “Turn it off.”

“Why?”

“Because I said so.”

“Just because you’re someone’s mom now doesn’t mean you're mine.” Arya rolls her eyes. “I’ll watch the game if I want.”

“I don’t give a flying fuck whether you watch the game, Arya, I said I don’t want Robbie watching it. I couldn’t care less about you.”

Hurt flickers over her face. “What’s your problem?”

“Give him to me.” She reaches for Robbie, resting on her shoulder, taking him into her arms. He babbles softly, pulling at her hair and she wonders if this is him telling her that he knows. 

Jon is on the screen talking to some pretty looking reporter. His hair is slicked back with sweat and his face is all flushed and he’s still got his mouthguard in and it’s almost unmistakable, his resemblance to her their boy. 

Her boy. 

“He’s mine.” She snaps at no one in particular, maybe at Arya, maybe at the screen, maybe at the world. She repeats it again, voice breaking a little. “He’s mine.”

And she goes back to her room, slamming the door shut. 

* * *

Sansa puts down Robbie for his nap not long after. She gets Bran to watch him while she goes out into the backyard. The grass is covered in snow, and there’s more falling down from the sky. 

She uses it to build a castle. 

It’s more of a house than it is a castle, actually. With her own backyard and her own snowy ground. It would be just hers, and Robbie’s. They could have their own christmas parties and send their own christmas cards. They would play hide and seek and watch movies. And they would never, under any circumstance, watch hockey. 

“You can’t keep doing this forever.”

Sansa recognizes her mother’s voice behind her, hears her footsteps treading the snow ground. 

“I only just started.”

“I’m not talking about the snow castle.” She sits down beside her. “You know that.”

She does.

She remembers what she said in the hospital, and she knows her mother does too. She’d catch her looking at Robbie sometimes, lips pursed, and she knew that she saw the same thing Sansa did. But until now, neither of them have ever brought it up. 

Catelyn grabs her hand. “You can’t keep holding onto someone who wasn’t willing to hold onto you.”

“I don’t know if he was. I never told him.”

A beat of silence passes. 

“And why was that?”

“I….” Shame burns like glass in her throat, and she swallows it down. “I wasn’t sure if given the choice that he would choose me. That he would choose us.”

Before she can look away, her mom takes her face in her hands, bringing them close. Their foreheads touch. Butterfly kisses, she used to call them when they were younger. 

“You did what was best to protect your family. That’s what mothers do.”

She remembers what her mother said when she first told her she was pregnant. Being a mother is pain and hurt and hardship. She is feeling it all right now, and she’s only been a mother for three months. But she’d do it again and again, for Robbie. 

“Focus on your boy.” Her mother whispers. “And leave that boy alone. Do whatever it takes to close that door. There’s nothing for you there.”

She thinks of Jon and his mouth against hers in their snowglobe and she thinks of Jon and his Stanley Cup and his pretty intermission reporters—it’s hard to believe that they’re the same person. Are they?

What does it matter, now?

She says, “I know.”

  
  


* * *

_ Do whatever it takes to close that door.  _

That night, she sits beside Robbie’s crib, with a pen to paper. She thinks of him, beautiful and hers, and she thinks of his father, also beautiful, but everyone else’s. Never hers. She thinks of all the past nine months and everything she wanted to tell him and decided she never would. She thinks of all the fantasies she played out in her head that she could never finish. She decides there might be safety in that after all. Predictability within unpredictability, knowing that she will never know what he would say to her because she’ll never ask.

That’s why she begins to write the letters.

At first, she writes as if she’s actually sending them.  _ Dear Jon, I have something to tell you. Dear Jon, you’re going to hate me. Dear Jon, please don’t be mad at me; try to understand.  _ But she finds that that limits her. She finds she’s still holding back, and isn’t that the point, to let it all out?

_ There’s nothing for you, there.  _

Her heart would never be empty or hollow of him, but perhaps one day, someone would be able to say the same thing to him about her too, once she moved on.

She needs to move on. 

So she begins to write.

_ Dear Jon, _

_ There will always be a part of me that loves you because you gave me the greatest gift in the world.  _

_ There’s a lot I want to tell you, but I won’t. So I’ll write this instead. _


End file.
